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LOTTIE AND VICTORINE; 


OR, 

WORKING THEIR OWN WAY. 


BY 

/ 

LUCY RANDALL (JOMFORT. 


iAN 11 1892 i) 


NEW YORK. 

GEORGE MUNRO, PUBLISHER, 
17 to 27 Vandkwater Street, 


pzs 

. G? s<- Lo 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1875, by 
GEORGE MUNRO, 

in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, Washington, D. C, 


Lottie and Victorine. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


CHAPTER L 

LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 

. “ One — two — three — four — five — six — seven-eight — 
nine!” Slowly, with iron tongue and resonant monosyllables, 
dying one by one into silence, the bell of the ancient French 
cathedral at Quebec told the hour of nine, and a slender 
young girl of about thirteen, who was leaning out of a window 
high up in the St. Louis Hotel, her whole weight supported 
on her elbows, and her chin nestled on her hands, drew back 
into the room. 

“ Nine o’clock. Vie,” she exclaimed, “ and papa not down 
yet.” 

The personage addressed by the diminutive of “ Yic ” was 
curled up, cross-legged like a tailor, in an exceedingly worn 
easy-cjhair, capacious enough to accommodate at least three per- 
sons of her slender dimensions. Her two hands were clasped 
upon her head, the fingers interlaced in a mass of burnished 
brown curls, and as her eyes traveled up and down the page 
of the book that lay open in her lap, she mechanically tugged 
and pulled at the aforesaid curls, as if she would pluck them 
out by the roots. 

At the clear treble voice of her young companion she 
started up. 

“Nine o’clock, Lottie! No, it isn’t nine yet. It can’t 
be!” 

“ Yes, it is. The cathedral bell just struck. And I’m as 
hungry as a bear.” 

Victorine Avenel — “ for short 99 called “ Vic,” shook her 
head gravely. 

“ It will never do to order breakfast before papa comes,” 
said she. 

“ Vic,” said Lottie, gravely, “ have you got any pennies?” 

tf Not a sou,” Victorine answered, with a second shake of 
the brown curls. 


(J 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“ Because if you had,” returned Lottie, somewhat disheart- 
ened, “ I could run out and buy some crackers.” 

And then followed a brief silence, during which Lottie, the 
elder sister, resumed her listless stare out of the window, and 
Victorine took another good hold of her curls, preparatory to 
plunging a second time into the enchanted pages of “ Rob 
Roy,” which chanced to be the volume at present engrossing 
her attention. And the morning sun, shining relentlessly in 
the flush of its June glory into the room, brought out every 
worn spot in the carpet, every faded streak in the wall paper, 
with uncompromising accuracy, just as mercilessly as a pho- 
tographer reveals every mole, wen, and wrinkle in the human 
face. 

It was by no means one of the best rooms in the house, 
either in size, location, or decoration. It was barely twelve 
feet wide, with a curious triangular piece blocked out of it — 
probably to form a wardrobe or closet for some adjoining 
apartment. It was very high up, with a curious suffocating 
sensation in the atmosphere, as if the roof were painfully close, 
and it was furnished in the plainest style, with a sofa bedstead 
on one side and a trunk on the other, two chairs, and the 
big “ Sleepy Hollow ” occupied by Victorine, a washing-stand 
half hidden by a futile attempt at chintz drapery, and an odd 
little distorted mirror in a tarnished gilt frame, while a 
great white cockatoo, stumbling about the floor, and uttering 
a curious croaking monologue, gave a jerk ever and anon at 
Lottie's dress, as if to call attention to the fact of his pres- 
ence. Then the girl would reach down her hand and stroke 
his white feathers, without looking around, as if this odd 
species of interruption were quite a matter of custom to her. 

“ Poor Pearl,” she said, “ poor fellow! you're hungry, and 
so am I. Never mind. Pearl f we'll wait a little longer.” 

The two sisters, now awaiting their father's appearance in 
their shabby little room, were strangely alike, and yet strange- 
ly dissimilar. Both were tall and slender, with scarcely any 
difference in their height, although Lottie was the eider by 
rather more than a year — both had luxuriant brown hair, in- 
clined to curl, and large, dark eyes, only Lottie's were of a 
soft velvety black, and Victorine's were of deep sapphire 
blue. But Lottie's face was round, with piquant, retrousse 
features, a deep dimple in her chin, and brunette peachiness 
of bloom on either cheek, while Victorine was pale, with an 
oval face, and pure, straight nose and chin, a sort of budding 
Madonna. 

Nobody would have had any difficulty in perceiving, from 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


7 


the mere details of their dress, that Lottie and Victorine 
Avenel were motherless girls. Not hut what their dresses of 
pale-blue French cambric were clean and whole, but they 
lacked the little accessories that so plainly betoken a mother's 
care and forethought. Their neck ribbons were crumpled, 
their collars pinned awry, their curls disheveled. Victorine 
had forgotten her cuffs, and Lottie had outgrown her frock 
just enough to give her the peculiar appearance of one walk- 
ing on stilts. 

“ Vic,” cried out the elder sister. 

“ Well, Lottie,” patiently responded the younger. 

“ I will have my breakfast. Is there any use in starving 
us because papa was out late last night?” 

“Lottie!” 

“Well, it's too bad!” cried out Lottie, marching up and 
down the room, with her arms folded behind her, to the mani- 
fest surprise and perplexity of the cockatoo, who regarded her 
from a corner, with his feathers puffed out, and his head very 
much on one side. “ Papa never thinks of us. He's always 
thinking of himself. ” 

“But, Lottie,” soothed Victorine, “ he has so many things 
on his mind.” 

“There are a great many things that are too bad,” per- 
sisted Lottie, evidently full charged with a sense of her 
wrongs. “ Look here, Vic, we ought to be going to school, 
you and 1.” 

“ I — I'm afraid we ought," reluctantly admitted Victorine. 
“ Of course, it's very pleasant to live just as we're living now, 
and read all the morning, and play with Pearlie,” with a 
loving glance at the cockatoo, who gave a discordant croak at 
the mention of his name, “ and walk on the terrace in the 
afternoons, to hear the band play. But I suppose we ought 
to be educated, like other girls. '' 

“ Ought,” echoed Lottie, with an intonation of something 
like scorn in her voice — “ of course we ought. Look at 
Helene Maurice, on the third floor. She isn't fourteen yet, 
and she is in the third class at Madame Tourrillon's. Look 
at Harry Percy, just my age, who has just got into Differ- 
ential Calculus. Do you know what Differential Calculus is, 
Vic?” 

“ N-no!” rather unwillingly confessed Victorine. 

“ 1 thought not,” said Lottie, with a triumphant nod of 
the head. “ Neither do I. We don't either of us know any- 
thing, Vic. But I know it has got something to do with 
mathematics.” 


8 




LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 

“ But, Lottie, Harry Percy is a boy.” 

“ Well, what if he is? Haven't you and I got as much 
brains as any boy going, if only they were cultivated? Then, 
Lulu Hyde plays on the piano beautifully. She wanted me 
to play the other night at her house, and 1 had to confess, be- 
fore the whole room full of company, that I didn't know one 
note from another! And Mary Hall is studying botany, with 
a whole book of pressed ferns — " 

“ I've got pressed ferns, too," said Victorine, radiantly. 

“But do you know their Latin names and classes?" de- 
manded inexorable Lottie. 

“ No, 1 don't," acknowledged Victorine. 

“ There it is. We're as ignorant as yonder marketwomen 
with their baskets of vegetables balanced on their heads. It's 
a shame!" 

“ My dear Charlotte, is there any necessity for speaking 
quite so loud?" uttered a low, delicately modulated voice — 
and Lottie Avenel started and turned red as she saw a slight, 
handsome man, who had entered from an opposite door just 
as she uttered her last asseveration. “ I dare say it's a 
shame. Most things are a shame in this world — but you'll 
never be a philosopher, my dear child, until you learn to take 
matters quietly. Now, ivill you oblige me by telling me what 
all this tirade is about?" 

Lottie Avenel hung her head — the deep crimson of mortifi- 
cation dyed her cheek. 

“ Papa," she faltered, “ I — I want to go to school." 

“You want to go to school, do you?" said Mr. Avenel, 
with an accent of sneering irony in his voice. “ Don't you 
think you had better go to breakfast first?" 

Victorine,’ who had risen from her chair, gave her sister's 
hand a little unseen squeeze as a token of reassurance and 
sympathy, as she stole to her side, and followed her down the 
steep and winding stairway that led to the dining-room. 

“ Don't mind papa, Lottie," she whispered. “ He's cross 
to-day. He's alwa} r s cross when he has been out late at 
night." 

Mr. Avenel troubled himself with no further attempts at 
unnecessary politeness or conventional attention to his daugh- 
ters, but unfolded his paper and plunged at once into its col- 
umns as he took his seat at the table, while Lottie and Victor- 
ine eat their breakfast in constrained silence. Somehow, they 
were always ill at ease in the polished presence of their fa- 
ther. 

He was a small, dark man with clear-cut features, a brow 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


9 


slightly bald, and black, sparkling eyes; a type of face entirely 
different from either of his daughters. Evidently their 
height, the sweet purity of their brows, and the vague promise 
of future beauty which already dwelt in form and feature, 
were inherited from the maternal side of their ancestry. But, 
although the newspaper served as a covert for his face, Mr. 
Avenel was not reading. He was thinking, and as he gnawed 
his under lip, and unconsciously knit his forehead, he glanced 
occasionally at his daughters with an expression of face which 
betokened anything in the world but paternal pride or gratifi- 
cation. 

“ Shooting up like weeds,” said Mr. Avenel to himself. 
“.Eating like young wolves! Wanting something all the 
time! What am 1 to do with them? Eh, Lindsay? The 
letters? Surely, it isn't post-time already!” 

“ Half past nine, sir,” said the hard-featured Scotchman, 
who had brought in the letters on a tray, and Lottie and Vic- 
torine looked a little apprehensively at each other. Long ex- 
perience had taught them that post-time was by no means a 
sweetener of their father's temper. 

Mr. Avenel tore open his letters and read them in perfect 
silence. Then for a few minutes he sat biting the end of 
one of the envelopes. All of a sudden his face cleared up; he 
pushed back his chair. 

“ Girls,” he said, “ it's a delightful day. How would you 
like to drive along the Beauport Road to Montmorenci Falls?” 

“ Oh, papa!” cried Victorine, with a gasp of delight. 

“ Oh, we should like it so much!” said Lottie, her face 
beaming all over with smiles. “ With you, papa?” 

“ With me — of course. Well, be ready at three precisely. 

I have business that will occupy me until then. 1 must wind 
up my business affairs and settle my little bills, for 1 think I 
shall leave Quebec soon.” 

“ Leave Quebec, papa?” asked Lottie, her dark eyes opened 
wide. “ Where are we going?” 

“ How can I tell, child? The world is all before us where 
to choose, as somebody or other says. Perhaps to Montreal. 
Perhaps to Boston or New York. And then it's just possible, 
Charlotte ” — Mr. Avenel never called his daughters by the pet 
names used between themselves — “ that you may realize your 
wishes of going to school. There, there, no ecstatics. 1 hate 
scenes, and always did. I'll see you again at three o'clock.” 

And so Mr. Percy Avenel parted from his daughters. 

“ Vic,” said Lottie, gravely, as they plodded together up 
the stairs, “ did you ever kiss papa?” 


10 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“ No, I don’t remember that 1 ever did/’ said Victorine, 
after a minute’s consideration. “ Did he ever kiss you V ’ 

“ No, never,” Lottie answered, slowly. 

“ Isn’t it strange?” said Victorine. “ Other girls are 
always kissing their papas, and being kissed by them.” 

“ It isn’t our papa’s way,” said Lottie, with a little shrug 
of her shoulders. 

“ I suppose if mamma had lived she would have kissed us 
often,” hazarded poor Victorine, after a brief silence. 

“ Oh, of course,” asserted Lottie. “ Mothers are different 
from fathers. But, 1 say. Vie, what shall we wear this after- 
noon?” 

Victorine hesitated, and shook her head. 

“ I don’t know,” said she. “ Our white muslins are too 
short, I’m afraid. Papa said,” with a little choke, “ that we 
looked like Dutch dolls the last time we wore them. And he 
desired us to put them in the rag-bag.” 

“ They are too good for that,” said Lottie, decidedly. “ I’ll 
tell you what, Vic, I’ll cut off the two lower flounces of yours 
and sew them om to mine. That will make it just about 
right. ” 

“ And who will wear it?” eagerly demanded Victorine, her 
eyes sparkling like twin fountains of blue light. 

“ Oh, we’ll draw lots for that. And I’ll sew on some black 
ribbon bows to cover the moth-eaten spots in the pink barege 
for the unlucky one to wear.” 

“ But that’s short, too!” said Victorine, wrinkling her 
smooth brows into an aspect of comical perplexity. 

“ Goosie! can’t you let down two of the tucks?” 

“ So 1 can,” said Victorine, jumping for the scissors, while 
Lottie gravely prepared two slips of paper of uneven length. 

“Now, come on, Vic!” said she. “Whoever draws the 
longest shall have the white muslin frock — whoever draws the 
shortest must be contented with the pink barege.” 

Victorine drew in her breath, pursed up her rosy lips, and, 
after a moment’s hesitation, made a pounce at the left-hand 
slip. 

“Good!” cried Lottie. “It’s the shortest. And 1 shall 
have the white muslin.” 

There was a merry little tinkle of girlish laughter at this — 
and then they sat down to their amateur dress-making, while 
the cockatoo, liberally fed with a breakfast of bread-crumbs 
and an orange which Lottie had smuggled from the break- 
fast-table, dozed in the sunshine. 

“ Lottie,” said Victorine, leaning her elbow on her knee. 


LOTTIE A ED VICTORIES. 


11 


and tapping her thimble against her little white teeth, “ how 
do you suppose girls feel who have just as many nice fresh 
dresses as they want to wear, and never have to clean their 
gloves with bread-crumbs, and send their sashes to be dyed?” 

“ I’m sure I don't know,” said Lottie, sagely. “ And I 
don't think I'm likely to know, either. Hand me the spool 
of thread, Vic. ” 

“It must be splendid to be rich,” said Victorine, ab- 
stractedly. 

“ Now, look here, Vic, this won't do!” said Lottie, im- 
peratively. 

“ What won't do?” 

“Talking, and mooning, and dreaming about being rich 
and owning lots of dresses, because both our best pocket-hand- 
kerchiefs have got to be done up, and our white thread gloves 
washed out, and our boots brightened up with French polish, 
yet! Come, hurry up, and when we get all through, we'll 
put on our nice things, and go and walk on Durham Ter- 
race.” 


CHAPTER IL 

WAITIED. 

Higher and brighter the sun had climbed the dazzling blue 
of the vault of heaven, until it hung like a great flaming jewel 
in mid-zenith over the ancient walled city of the North. The 
trees in the Governor's Garden waved softly to and fro in the 
fresh breeze — the Old Town lay hushed below the ramparts, 
its huddled chimney-stacks and moss-grown roofs looking like 
children's toys from the ramparts above, and the blue St. 
Lawrence flashed back the sunbeams like sheeted diamonds, 
as, side by side, Lottie and Victorine Avenel walked up and 
down the magnificent heights of Durham Terrace, at this 
time of day comparatively deserted save by nurse-maids, stray 
sight-seers, and novel-reading young ladies. 

“ Vic,” said Lottie, suddenly pausing, and wheeling 
around, “ how do we look?” 

“We look very nice,” said Victorine, laughing. “All 
cOrnme il faut , as old Monsieur Becquand says.” 

“ Do you suppose any one knows that my dress is pieced 
down by two of your flounces, and that those black bows of 
yours are only sewed on to cover moth-holes?” 

“ Of course not,” said Victorine, contentedly. “ How 
should they?” 

“ Look at that girl reading on the seat yonder,” said Lottie, 


12 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


lowering her voice to a whisper. “ She has got a dress of lilac 
silk, with a real lace sacque, and a hat that 1 know came 
straight from Paris.” 

“ I see her,” said Victorine, in the same tone. “ What of 
her?” 

“ Nothing; only she makes me feel like what I am — a 
dowdy. Look at those delicious moss roses on her hat, and 
then at our poor mangy buds, that have been clipped with the 
scissors and twisted and turned to make their shabbiness one 
degree less apparent. Look at her lavender kid gloves, that 
fit like the skin, and see our cheap thread things, that have 
been washed a thousand and one times.” 

“ She has got money, and we haven’t,” said Victorine. 
“ Don’t look at her any longer, Lottie; it only makes you 
miserable.'” 

“Not miserable,” said Lottie. “Only — why weren’t we 

born with gold spoons in our mouths?” 

“ Don’t fret, Lottie,” said Victorine, laughing. “ It’s bet- 
ter to be lucky than rich.” 

“ And, so far as I can see, we are neither the one nor the 
other,” said Lottie. “ Vic, here’s a peanut boy; let’s buy a 
penny’s worth of peanuts, and eat ’em.” 

Victorine recoiled a little at this very democratic proposi- 
tion. 

“ What, here? On the terrace?” said she. 

“ Why not?” 

“ I don’t think it would be quite the thing,” hesitated Vic- 
torine. “ I don’t believe that young lady in the lilac silk and 
the Paris hat eats peanuts on Durham Terrace. Peanuts are 
— well, just a little vulgar; don’t you think so?” 

“ Oh, pshaw!” said Lottie, feeling in her pocket for the 
little wire porte-monnaie that contained all her earthly wealth. 
“If we can’t be fashionable, let’s at least be jolly. Boy, 
here! Give me a penny’s worth of peanuts.” 

Victorine hesitated a little at first, but the peanuts smelled 
deliciously fragrant as Lottie cracked them between her strong 
white teeth, and flung the shells into the river below, and 
presently she, too, sat down beside her sister, and threw her 
gentility to the winds. And so the two young girls, leaning 
over the terrace wall, eat their peanuts, and dreamily looked 
over the superb panorama of rocks and river and scattered 
villages far away. 

“ Only think, Vic,” said the elder one, giving Victorine’s 
waist a little' sudden squeeze, “ we’re going to boarding- 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 13 

school. Won’t it be splendid? Because, just see how big and 
tall we are, and I am so ashamed of knowing so little.” 

“ But we do know some things,” said Yictorine, stoutly. 
“ 1 took a walk here with Lulu Hyde the other day, and for 
all her fine piano playing, she never had heard of how General 
Montgomery rode up these heights, almost a hundred years 
ago; nor about Wolfe and Montcalm, nor Jacques Cartier, 
nor any of the history of Quebec. ” 

“We read that in Parley’s History,” said Lottie. “ That 
isn’t much; everybody knows history. But when we really 
get to be accomplished, like other girls, Yic — when we can 
speak French, and sing ballads, and do Differential Calculus, 
and all that sort of thing — ” 

She stopped short here. A tall, good-looking boy of four- 
teen or fifteen, unmistakably American in dress and manner, 
with the United States stamp in every feature of his hand- 
some face, had sauntered up to them. 

“ Beg pardon,” said he, slightly moving his hat, but not 
removing it from his head, “ but is this the Citadel, sis?” 

Lottie straightened herself up with girlish dignity. 

“ 1 am not your ‘ sis,’ ” said she. “ And 1 should think 
you would knoiv that the Citadel is up yonder,” pointing with 
one slim finger to the left. 

“Aren’t you pretty independent for peanut eaters?” said 
the boy, laughing. “ Come, now! Are these Quebec man- 
ners?” 

Lottie turned away from him, deigning no reply. 

“ Why don’t you answer me?” persisted the boy, half 
vexed, half impelled by a mischievous spirit of teasing, which 
appears to be indigenous in boy nature. “ Come, Miss Que- 
bec— are those your manners to strangers in town, eh?” 

Still there was no answer; and the boy, advancing still 
closer, lifted his arm, and by a careless sweep of his hand 
knocked Lottie’s hat off her head. 

“ Now, will you answer?” he demanded, curtly. 

He had meant to grasp the luckless hat in its descent, but 
he was too late, and the next instant it had fallen far below, 
down into the confused mass of chimney-tops in the Old 
Town. 

In the white-heat glow of her sudden anger, Lottie sprung- 
forward and struck the lad such a blow on the face as left the 
prints of her five resolute fingers plainly impressed upon his 
cheek, and at the same minute she caught the smart, black- 
ribboned straw hat from his head and flung it over the terrace 
railing. 


14 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“ There !” cried she. “ Your hat has gone to keep mine 
company. Try that again, will you?” 

The boy’s face flushed almost purple with wrath. 

“ If you wasn’t a girl,” said he, in a voice husky with pas- 
sion, “ I’d pay you off.” 

“ Would you, indeed?” cried breathless little Lottie, half 
frightened, half exultant. “ Now clear out, or I’ll call the 
police.” 

The boy might have lingered for a yet longer display of 
hostilities were it not for the fact that an actual, undeniable 
policeman was visible, strolling in that direction from the 
other end of the terrace; and he turned and stalked sullenly 
away, muttering under his breath some indistinct menace or 
other. 

“ Lottie,” said Victorine, who had stood pale and panic- 
stricken during the whole of the brief melee , “I’m afraid 
you’ve been very rude.” 

Lottie uttered a gleeful little chuckle. 

“ Didn’t I serve him right?” said she. “ Hateful fellow!” 

“ But 1 don’t think he really meant to knock yo“ur hat 
off.” 

“ I don’t care what he meant,” said Lottie, still flushed 
and panting; “ I only know what he did!” 

Still Victorine shook her head. 

“ 1 don’t think boarding-school young ladies do such 
things,” said she. 

Lottie laughed. 

“ Wasn’t he astonished?” said she. “I don’t think he’ll 
try it on again. Come, Vic, we must be getting home.” 

“ But you’ve no hat,” 

“ I must tie a pocket-handkerchief over my head,” retorted 
Lottie. 

“ And how about the drive to Montmorenci Falls?” per- 
sisted Victorine. 

“ Oh, I can borrow Lulu Hyde’s hat just for once.” 

“ I wouldn’t like to borrow of those Hydes,” said Victor- 
ine. “ They are so haughty and scornful!” 

“ 1 know that,” nodded Lottie; “ but we don’t get a drive 
in a caleche to Montmorenci Falls every day. 1 must go. 
And I must have Lulu Hyde’s hat.” 

The two girls eat their dinner, Mr. Avenel having men- 
tioned at the breakfast-table that he should probably take that 
meal with a friend, and got themselves ready for the drive. 
Miss Lulu Hyde fortunately having been in a propitious mood 


LOTTIE AND VICTOKINE. 15 

when Lottie Avenel craved audience. But three o'clock came, 
and no Mr. Avenel. 

“Never mind!" said Victorine, trying to repress her im- 
patience. “ Papa is always late." 

“ Of course he'll engage Jean Pierre and the old gray 
horse," said Lottie. “ Or perhaps he has already engaged 
him. I mean to go down and see." 

And flying down the stairs, she rushed out of the door to 
where a sleepy-looking old Canadian-Frenchman was leaning 
against one of the gayly gilded and decorated vehicles which 
are so unlike the hacks ordinarily in use further south. 

“Jean!" she cried, in her high, sweet treble. “Jean! 
has papa engaged you for a drive along the Beauport Load?" 

The old man raised himself from his semi-trance. 

“No. But, mademoiselle," he made answer, “ Monsieur 
Avenel has gone. " 

“ Gone? Gone whither?" 

“ In Martin Genoux's caleche. Two hours since. To 
Montmorenci Falls." 

“ Oh, nonsense!" exclaimed Lottie. “ You're asleep and 
dreaming now, Pierre. Papa is to go out with us at three 
o'clock. He hasn't come yet." 

“ 1 am not asleep, mademoiselle, and I do not dream," said 
Jean Pierre, shaking his grizzled head. “ 1 saw monsieur, 
your papa, with these eyes. I heard him give the, order to 
Martin Genoux with these ears." 

“ I- don't understand it at all," said Lottie, meditatively. 
“ How can papa be gone to Montmorenci Falls already, when 
he distinctly promised to take Victorine and me?" 

Again Jean Pierre shook his head. He was not prepared 
to argue the question, only to state simple facts. 

“ Mademoiselle will doubtless learn for herself when Martin 
Genoux returns," said he; and Lottie flew upstairs to relate 
her story to Victorine's listening ears. 

“ The old man must be mistaken," said Victorine, decidedly. 

“ Of course he is," said Lottie. “ But, Vic, it's nearly four 
o'clock. What do you suppose keeps papa?" 

“ No matter," said Victorine, consolingly. “ He is often 
as late as that, and it will be all the cooler when we do start." 

But when the hands of the clock had traveled around to 
half after four, even Victorine's slender stock of patience and 
philosophy began to fail her. 

“ Lottie," said she, “ 1 do truly believe that papa has for- 
gotten all about us." 

Lottie looked aghast at this unpleasant view of affairs. 


1 G 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“But, Victorine — ” she began, when suddenly a smart 
knock at the door cut her speech short, and a servant handed 
in a sealed note. 

“ Martin Genoux, the caleche driver, has just brought it, 
miss/’ said he. 

Lottie and Victorine looked at each other in surprise, not 
unmingled with a little awe. Letters were rare and unfrequent 
events in the current of their daily lives, and the elder sister 
took the note from the tray with some trepidation. 

“ Look, Vic,” she whispered, “ it is from papa. 1 wonder 
why he wrote to us.” 

“ Why don't you open it and read it?” questioned Victorine, 
herself scarcely less excited than her sister. “ Perhaps it is 
to tell us to meet him at the Falls!” 

“ Of course it is,” cried Lottie, unconsciously relieved. “ I 
wonder I did not think of that before.” 

Eagerly she broke the seal — a splash of violet wax against 
the paler lavender of the envelope — and unfolded its contents. 
Thus, with faces close together, the two girls read, in Mr. 
Avenel's delicate, clerk-like hand, each word formed with the 
daintiest precision, and not a comma left out of its proper 
place, these words: 

“ My dear Daughters, — It is with an indescribable com- 
mingling of emotion that 1 pen these brief lines, knowing that, 
when I am no more, they will serve as a sort of interpretation 
of my wishes and desires to those I loved in life.” 

Lottie, who had seated herself in a low chair by the window, 
looked up with a scared face into Victorine's eyes as she read 
the lines. 

“ What does he mean, Vic?” she cried out. “Oh! Vic, 
what can he possibly mean?” 

“ 1 don't know,” Victorine made answer, in a low, tremu- 
lous voice. “ Read on.” 

“ 1 don't think it necessary to tell you,” went on the letter, 
“ that I have done my best to fight the battle of life, and have 
-been defeated. Fate and Destiny have alike opposed them- 
selves to me, and 1 am weary of the unequal contest. And 
now, at the last, my affairs, financial and otherwise, have 
complicated themselves into such a hopeless confusion, that I 
can only escape from them by the bold plunge into the dark 
which 1 am now about to take. My life has been a failure, 
and I throw up the game at last. When you read these lines. 


LOTTIE AN1) VICTORINE. 


17 


my daughters, I shall be lying dead and cold in the fathomless 
caves at the bottom of Montmorenci Falls. Farewell! May 
my memory be dearer to you than I could ever have been in 
life, is the dying prayer of your unfortunate but devoted fa- 
ther, Percy Avenel. ” 

Victorine stood like a statue, pale and rigid, looking down 
into the face of her sister, who had dropped the letter, with a 
low, agonized cry. 

“ Oh, Yic, what shall we do? Where shall we go? What 
will become of us?” she wailed. 

And clasped in each other's arms, the two young girls 
mingled their tears, while the letter, evidently the handiwork 
of one who aspired to make a sensation of some sort, even in 
death, lay on the floor at their feet, the miniature bomb-shell 
which had carried such confusion into their little camp. 


CHAPTER III. 

LEFT ALONE. 

“ Gone off and left you!” cried out Mrs. Algernon Hyde, 
who occupied a suite of elegant rooms on the drawing-room 
floor of the St. Louis Hotel. “ It isn't possible, Charlotte 
Avenel. You must have misunderstood him. Committed sui- 
cide? But that isn't at all in keeping with your poor dear 
papa's character. So excessively gentlemanly, you know. Let 
me see the note. There is some mistake, I am certain.” 

But a careful perusal of Percy Avenel 's last literary effort 
convinced Mrs. Hyde that the two girls were undoubtedly cor- 
rect in the inferences they had drawn. Mr. Hyde was sum- 
moned from his place of business down in one of the narrow 
little streets, where the inhabitants could almost have shaken 
hands from the opposite windows, over the tops of carts and 
calcches below — the landlord of the hotel was sent for to as- 
sist at the conference, and Martin Genoux was called upon to 
throw what little illumination he could on the murky busi- 
ness. He, however, could give small information. All he 
knew was that “ Monsieur Avenel " had hired him to drive 
him, the American monsieur, to the Falls — that he had left 
him at the little inn where he usually left his passengers. 
Monsieur had appeared calm and collected as usual, and on 
paying him, had requested him to hand a note to his daugh- 
ters at the St. Louis Hotel, when he should return thither. 


18 


LOTTIE AND VICTOIUNE. 


lie had asked monsieur if he did not intend riding back. 
Monsieur had answered no, that he preferred the walk. This 
did not surprise honest Martin, he parenthetically added, as it 
was the custom of many American and English messieurs to 
walk — worse luck for the caleche drivers. He had chanced to 
look back, as he drove away— not that he had suspected any- 
thing amiss — and had seen Mr. Avenel walking leisurely down 
the little winding path which led toward the brink of the 
Falls, his hands behind his. back and a cigar between his lips. 
And that was all. 

Inquiry was made as speedily as possible at the little Mont- 
morenci inn, but with no more satisfactory result. The at- 
tendants there had seen Martin Genoux's passenger alight — 
had received the gate fee to the Falls at his hand— but had not 
seen him return. Close to the edge of the steepest portion of 
the precipice down which the silvery sheet of foam and spray 
descended with a sound like mimic thunder, the ground 
had crumbled away, as if footsteps had advanced to the very 
brink, and a half-burned cigar lay on the close turf. Beyond 
these no traces could be discerned. 

“If he really did jump into the Falls / 9 said Mr. Algernon 
Hyde, smoothing his close-shaven chin, and taking particularly 
good care to keep well away from the edge of the cliff, whither 
he had gone to survey the scene of the tragedy, “ all search 
would be in vain.” 

“ Ah, monsieur, quite so,” said the French attendant, who 
had accompanied them. “ Monsieur knows — monsieur must 
often have heard — the sad story of the poor peasants who fell 
into the Fall when the Suspension Bridge broke down,” with 
a glance at the ruinous stone piers that still stood like monu- 
mental shafts, the sole relics of the unfortunate Suspension 
Bridge, “ how their bodies never were recovered. As well try 
to sound the Atlantic as to get at the bottom of the caves that 
underlie yonder sheet of foam.” 

And so they returned to Quebec, none the wiser for their 
expedition. 

A little judicious inquiry on the part of Mr. Hyde revealed 
the fact that all the outstanding bills of Mr. Avenel were paid; 
that even his board at the hotel was settled to date. ‘Some 
carefully boxed pictures and packing-cases which he had in 
storage at the top of a dingy building near by were directed 
to a distant relative in the States, and his few personal be- 
longings were left in the most systematic order. 

“ By Jove!” said Algernon Hyde, “ there was a method in 
this fellow's madness.” 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


19 


And stooping, with his eyeglasses to his eyes, he read the 
inscription on the card tacked to the largest box : 

“MISS JOANNA AVENEL, 

“ West Haven, 

“ Conn. 

“ {To be sent by express.)” 

“Miss Joanna Avenel,” he repeated. “And who the 
deuce is Miss Joanna Avenel?” 

The two young orphans, when appealed to on this subject, 
could not enlighten his ignorance. They never had heard 
their father speak of his relatives; neither had they ever 
asked any questions upon this subject. 

“ Humph!” commented Mr. Hyde, again feeling his smooth 
chin. “I'll get out the big atlas and look up the localities. 
Whoever Miss Joanna Avenel may be, it's a clew which is cer- 
tainly well worth following out. She must be some relation 
to you, my poor children, and if she were seventy times re- 
moved, why, we all know that blood is thicker than water. 
Lulu, bring me the atlas, child.” 

Throughout all the great buzzing human beehive of the 
hotel, a sort of kindly and pitying interest seemed to be felt 
for the two young girls left so suddenly and terribly alone — 
but they seemed to shrink from notice. 

“ If we could only go away somewhere,” said Lottie, wist- 
fully. “ People point at us as if we were curiosities — and 
only yesterday the hack-drivers on the street were whispering 
to each other, 4 There go the petite demoiselles whose father 
drowned himself in the Montmorenci Falls. * ” 

“ And,” added Victorine, “ Lulu Hyde asked me why we 
didn't put on mourning?” 

“And what did you answer her?” 

“ 1 said we hadn't got any money.” 

There was a brief silence, and then Victorine added : 

“ Mary Hall thinks it likely that we shall be sent to some 
orphan asylum, or given up to the Sisters of Charity.” 

“Mary Hall is mistaken, then,” retorted Lottie, with a 
crimson flush rising to her cheeks. “ 1 won't go to any 
asylum — neither shall you.” 

“ But, Lottie, what are we to do?” pleaded Victorine. 

“ Something — anything — 1 don’t care what!” answered 
Lottie, tearing the scented leaves off a sprig of lemon verbena 
which she held with merciless fingers, and breathing very 
quick and fast. 


— 


20 LOTTIE AND V1CTOKINE* 

“We can’t stay here.” 

“ Then we will go away.” 

“ But where?” 

“I don’t know yet,” responded Lottie. “1 haven’t had 
time to think. Do you know, Vic,” with firmly set lips and 
eyes full of hard, glittering light, “ I think papa did a very 
cowardly thing when he — when he drowned himself 3” 

“ Oh, Lottie!” 

“Yes, cowardly /” and Lottie Avenel flung the sprig of 
lemon verbena out of the window as she spoke. “ What else 
was it, to go deliberately out of the world, leaving us behind 
to bear the cruel brunt of everything? He was a strong man; 
we are only two helpless girls. What did he suppose was to 
become of us ?” 

“ Lottie,” said Victorine, gravely, “ it’s wrong to talk so. 
I won’t listen to it.” 

“I don’t care,” said Lottie. “I can’t help thinking it, 
and so I may as well say it.” 

There is an old saying that if half the world could see what 
was going on in the other half, they would be .considerably 
astonished. And if Lottie and Victorine Avenel could have 
been gifted with second-sight on that balmy J une evening, 
when all the bells of Quebec were jangling for vespers, and 
the monument of brave Wolfe, upon the breezy Heights of 
Abraham, was bathed in sunset glory, they would almost have 
refused to credit the evidence of their senses. 

For, at the luxuriously spread dinner-table of the St~. Law- 
rence Hall, in the city of Montreal, at that self-same hour, 
with a napkin spread carefully to protect his embroidered 
linen shirt-front, a glass of Sauterne beside him, and engaged 
in picking out the choicest of a plate of forced strawberries, 
with iced sponge-cake within reach, and a vase of roses placed 
just where he could inhale their delicious breath, sat the 
identical personage whom they all believed to be lying in the 
fathomless depths of the Falls of Montmorenci — Percy Ave- 
nel himself. 

“ Waiter — a little more ice to this wine,” he said, in a voice 
as unlike the accents of a ghost as possible. “ And bring me 
the paper. Heigho!” as he leaned back in his chair, serenely 
picking his teeth with a small implement of ivory, gold 
mounted, “ I suppose my poor little girls are crying the 
coronach over me just now. But it was among the inevita- 
bles. I never could have got rid of ’em without some 
strategy. And in these hard times, how is a man to succeed 
with two great girls hung around his neck, like a double- 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


21 


shotted mill-stone? There are times in life when a man has 
to beat a retreat, and leave all his superfluous luggage be- 
hind. And I dare say they’ll get along very well. Girls 
always do. They’re like that useful domestic animal, the cat, 
so often cited in story and proverb, which is always sure to 
fall on her feet. Oh, yes, they’re better off without me.” 

And Mr. Avenel popped a particularly large and luscious 
strawberry into his mouth, with a truly epicurean apprecia- 
tion of its flavor and sweetness, as he slowly masticated it. 

“If I had two half-grown daughters tacked to me,” he 
soliloquized, “ I couldn’t eat forced strawberries, drink 
Sau ter ne, and stop at a hotel like this. Undoubtedly, I have 
selected the best course. I couldn’t do much for ’em. And 
there’s no sort of doubt but what they’ll do very well for 
themselves. What must be, must be, and there’s no use in 
rebelling against the inevitable.” 

All of which theorizing went to prove what a sublime phi- 
losopher Mr. Percy Avenel had grown to be. 


CHAPTER IV. 

A PAIR OF LOVERS. 

“So you’re going to be. married, eh?” said Mrs. Deacon 
Van Vorst, as she leaued over a certain neatly painted white 
garden gate, on the road somewhere between New Haven and 
its pretty little suburb of West Haven, and elevated her voice 
to reach the ears of a sun-bonneted personage who was dili- 
gently engaged in weeding a “ posy patch ” in the front door- 
yard. 

“ Who told you 1 was going to be married?” said Miss 
Joanna Avenel, with a startling suddenness of interrogation 
which, combined with the fact that she suddenly rose to her 
feet and faced her interlocutor, made Mrs. Deacon Van Vorst 
step back a pace or two, as if a fire-cracker had exploded in 
front of her. 

“ Why, everybody’s a-talkin’ about it,” retorted the ma- 
tron, in an injured tone of voice. 

“ Then it’s a pity everybody else hain’t something better 
to occupy their time and tongue,” said Miss Avenel, jerking 
a fine spreading root of parsley out of the ground and fling- 
ing it into the weed-basket. 

“ That’s what I told ’em,” said Mrs. Van Vorst, com- 
placently settling her cap ribbons. “I said there wa’n’t a 
word of truth in it. 1 said that I didn’t believe Joanna Ave- 
nel, after living fifty years in single blessedness — ” 


22 


LOTTIE AND VICTOKINE. 


“Forty-seven/’ interjected Miss Avenel, prodding away 
with her trowel at the ground. 

“ Well, forty-seven— 1 said 1 didn't believe you'd be such a 
fool as to surrender your independence to any man going." 

“ Then you said what wasn't so," said Miss Joanna Avenel, 
straightening herself up a second time, and again looking 
directly into Mrs. Van Vorst's yellowish-gray eyes. 

“Eh?" 

“ Because I am going to be married." 

“ To Philo Spelman?" breathlessly questioned Mrs. Van 
Vorst. 

“ Yes, to Philo Spelman. There! Now! What'll you 
make of that V’ 

“ Well, I never!" said Mrs. Van Vorst, feebly fanning her- 
self with her pocket-handkerchief, and feeling for a store of 
cardamom seeds and fennel tops, which she generally carried 
in her left-hand pocket. “ If 1 hadn't a-had it from your 
own lips, Joanna Avenel, I couldn't a-believed it." 

“ No, I s'pose not," said Miss Avenel, with a sly twinkle 
in her small, malicious eyes. “ You thought I was too much 
of an old maid ever to have a chance that way. But, you see, 
1 shall step off yet, afore your Melissy Ann, in spite of her 
melodeon playin', and wax-flower makin', and all that sort of 
foolery. 1 do hope Melissy Ann ain't a-goin' to be an old 
maid, after all. That would be too aggravatin'." 

She stood watching Mrs. Van Vorst as that aggrieved ma- 
tron trundled off down the road, with as much dignity as four 
feet of height and two hundred avoirdupois weight of flesh 
would permit her to assume, with chuckling satisfaction. 

“ 1 had her there," thought Miss Joanna Avenel. “ Don't 
I know just how mad Melissy Ann Van Vorst is, because she 
hain't succeeded in netting Philo Spelman her own self? 
And won't she be madder yet when she sees me walkin’ into 
church with a bridal wreath and veil, and a white silk gown 
made, every stitch of it, in New Haven?" 

To understand the full depth and height and breadth of 
Miss Joanna Avenel's complacent self-gratulation, the reader 
must be made distinctly to comprehend that the aforesaid 
Philo Spelman, a well-to-do, but most miserly bachelor of the 
community, had been the object of her maiden ambition for 
more years than she liked to count up. Miss Joanna Avenel, 
albeit she owned a comfortable little place of her own, was 
unutterably weary of a single life, and Philo Spelman, as the 
only eligible match of the vicinage, suited her ideas exactly. 

Mr. Spelman had shown considerable ingenuity and strategy 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


23 


in evading for so long the nets spread, not only by Miss 
Joanna, bat by all the other single ladies, old, young, and 
middle-aged, of the neighborhood — but there is a Waterloo to 
every general, and his had come at last. How he did it, he 
never quite understood, although he frequently tried to think 
it over, and, as he expressed it, “lay his finger just on the 
place ” — but one spring evening, after he had been over to 
counsel Miss Joanna about grafting a young apple-orchard 
that she had just set out, he walked home again an engaged 
man. 

“ Hadn’t no more idea of it when I set my foot on the 
threshold of that there door,” said Mr. Spelman, smiting his 
brow with the palm of his hand, in a sort of frenzy (let us 
hope of joy), “ than I had of cutting my throat.” 

Eather an unfortunate simile, but Mr. Spelman, not being 
of an imaginative or poetical temperament, had not a great 
variety of synonyms in his mental repertoire. 

Upon this particular evening, as she slowly stalked up the 
path, a short, black pipe in his mouth, and his hands in his 
pockets, he wore anything but the aspect of a happy bride- 
groom-elect. Miss Avenel, who, having finished her weeding, 
sat knitting on the porch, welcomed him with a sweet smile, 
and made room for him on the splint settee beside her. 

“ No, thank’ee,” said Philo Spelman. “ I’d rather set here 
on the steps. Hope my smokin’ ain’t no ways disagreeable.” 

“ Not at all,” said Miss Avenel, with a sweet smile. But 
as she spoke the words, she secretly resolved that one of her 
first acts of married authority should be to depose that pipe, 
at once and forever. 

Happily unconscious of the thoughts passing through the 
mind of his betrothed, Mr. Spelman blew short puffs of smoke, 
and shook his head meditatively. 

“ Only three weeks left now, Joanna,” said he, lugubri- 
ously, “ before the wedding-day.” 

Miss Joanna tried to blush, but only succeeded in dropping 
three stitches in her knitting instead. 

“ Very true, Philo,” simpered she. 

“ Three weeks will soon pass,” groaned Mr. Spelman. 

“ Yes, indeed,” assented Joanna. 

“ Joanna,” said Mr. Spelman. 

“ Well, Philo?” 

“ Don’t you think, now, that it would be kind o’ sensible to 
put the whole thing off until fall?” anxiously queried the 
bridegroom-elect. 


24 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“ No, 1 don't,” said Miss Avenel. “ Where would be the 
use?” 

“ Yes, that's very true,” reluctantly admitted Mr. Spel- 
man, looking into the bowl of his pipe. “ What's got to be, 
has got to be. It's just like havin' a tooth out — there's no 
use dodgin'.” 

Miss Avenel winced a little at this rather unusual compari- 
son; but just then Mr. Spelman, who had been feeling in his 
pocket for an additional supply of tobacco, rose to his feet. 

“ Je— rusalem!” said he; “I'd like to have forgot. I've 
got a letter for you in my pocket, Joanna. Pete Hawkins 
gin it to me as I come by the post-office.” 

“ A letter!” Miss Joanna made a grasp at it with the in- 
stinctive curiosity that fires the breast of every woman at the 
sight of a sealed envelope. “ Who should write a letter to 
me?” 

“ And a foreign post-stamp, with Queen Victory's head on 
it, too,” said Mr. Spelman, as Miss Avenel hurriedly tore it 
open. 

“ It's from the express agent at Quebec,” said she, “ noti- 
fying me that some pictures, books, and other effects, belong- 
ing to my brother Percy, have been sent to the office here.” 

“ Oh!” said Mr. Spelman. “ That's the fellow that 
drowned himself, ain't it?' ' 

“Yes,” responded Miss Joanna, refolding the letter and 
putting it in her pocket. 

“ Some folks would ha' said our marriage ought to be put 
off a spell on that account,” said Mr. Spelman, with a faint 
gleam of hope irradiating his fishy eyes. 

“ Oh, pshaw!” said Miss Joanna, sharply. “ Why, 1 
haven't seen him since 1 was sixteen year old. He never 
cared for me, nor I for him.” 

Mr. Spelman sighed. 

“Well,” said he, “ anyhow his traps 'ill help to furnish up 
a little. I do hope there ain't much expressage to pay. If 
there is, Joanna, I'd advise you to refuse to receive 'em. 
Books and pictures ain't of much account, arter all.” 

Miss Joanna once more took the letter from her pocket, and 
glanced first at the date, then at the post-mark. “ Twelve 
days ago!” said she. “ My goodness alive! where has this 
letter been detained?” 

“ Well, if that's the case,” said Mr. Spelman, jumping to 
his feet with alacrity, “ it's 'most likely them goods is wait- 
in' at the express office for us to claim 'em.” 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 25 

“ I should think it very likely/’ said Miss Joanna, after a 
few minutes of consideration. 

“ Let’s go and look arter ’em,” said Philo. “ It ain’t but 
a half mile away. Get your hat, Joanna.” 

And Miss Avenel acceded to this proposition, although she 
was wearied with a long day of house-cleaning, whitewashing, 
and amateur painting on the ceiliug of the back piazza. But 
she was anxious to see what bequests her hitherto neglectful 
brother had left her; nor was she proof against the tempting 
prospect of leading Philo Spelman, in chains, as it were, past 
the very front porch of Mrs. Deacon Van Vorst, and her 
daughter, Melissa Ann. Mrs. Van Vorst and her daughter 
had dealt the spinster many a sly stab in the dark during the 
last twenty years; nor was Miss Joanna at all averse to a lit- 
tle comfortable revenge. 

She went in and tied on a Shaker bonnet, which made her 
sharp, angular face look a degree less feminine and inviting 
than before, and folded a cheap, printed shawl around her 
shoulders, making her toilette de 'promenade in a space of time 
that would have astounded a Broadway or Fifth Avenue belle, 
and rejoined her impatient fiance at the door. 

“ Come on!” said Mr. Philo Spelman, shambling ahead 
with his hands in his pockets, and Miss Avenel trudged after. 
She would have liked him to offer her his arm, or to attempt, 
in some degree, to accommodate his pace to her own, for 
Joanna Avenel, hard and masculine though she was, had some 
appreciation of the little gracefulnesses and amenities of life; 
but that was not Philo Spelman’s style, and she knew it. 

“ If the expressage is more than ten dollars, don’t you take 
the pesky things,” counseled Philo. “ Money is money, and 
second-hand traps is second-hand traps, and nothin’ else.” 

Miss Avenel said nothing. Perhaps she thought that her 
future, lord and master was already beginning to take too 
much upon himself. She had been accustomed, during the 
whole forty-seven years of her life, to have things pretty much 
her own way, and scarcely relished this arbitrary sort of in- 
terference. However, she preserved a wise silence, more par- 
ticularly as they were just at this moment passing the vine- 
covered porch of the Van Vorst farm-house, where Mrs. Van 
Vorst herself, together with the disappointed Miss Melissa 
Ann, was sitting enjoying the cool of the evening. And the 
delicious triumph of that one moment was worth a good deal 
of Mr. Spelman’s prying, meddling, and dictating, and so 
Miss Joanna Avenel felt it. 

Mrs. Van Vorst and her daughter exchanged smiles and 


26 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


greetings of hypocritical sweetness as the pedestrians trudged 
by, but their faces changed when there was no longer any 
danger of observation. 

“ There goes that horrid old maid and the poor, miserable 
creetur' she has hooked,” said Mrs. Van Vorst, with a hys- 
terical giggle. 

44 Must be hard up for a husband, to take Philo Spelman,” 
said Miss Melissa Ann, who had tried her best to fascinate the 
gentleman in question. 

And mother and daughter elevated their noses with great 
outward show of scorn as Mr. Spelman and his betrothed 
bride went on toward the express office. 


CHAPTER Y. 

BACKING OUT OF A BARGAIN. 

The express office was in the same building with the rail- 
way station, and had for storage purposes a large, unfurnished 
room which occupied the whole of the second story of the 
station. As Miss Avenel and her companion entered the sta- 
tion, the express agent peered out of his little inclosed office. 

“ Oh, it's you, is it, Miss Avenel?” said he, picking up a 
straw and beginning to chew diligently at it. “1 was just 
going to send a boy up to your place. They came half an 
hour ago. ” 

44 The things?” 

44 Yes,” the agent made answer, with a curious twinkle in 
his eyes. 44 The things! And I guess you'll be pretty con- 
siderable astonished when you see 'em.” 

4 4 Astonished! I'm never astonished at nothin',” said Miss 
Joanna, peevishly. 44 And I dare say the express rates'll 
s waller up three times the worth of the plagued things.” 

44 Oh! 1 guess not,” said the man, laughing. “ I’ve gin 
'em something to eat, and — ” 

44 What in creation are you talkin' about?” sharply de- 
manded Miss Avenel, turning and looking him full in the 
face. 44 If Percy Avenel's been sending me a pack of good- 
for-nothing dogs, or monkeys, or any such trash, I will give 
up. 1 won't pay one cent of express. 1 — ” 

44 Well, well, there is no use flying out in that sort of way,” 
said the agent, soothingly. 44 There ain't no dogs, and there 
ain't no monkeys, that you may be sartin of.” 

44 What is it, then? Percy always did have a lot of out- 
landish pets about him, making more trouble than they were 
worth.” 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


27 


The man made no other answer to this than to unlock with 
a key which he took from his pocket the door at the foot of 
the staircase, and to beckon Miss Avenel and Mr. Spelman to 
ascend, while he slowly followed them, with a backward grin 
toward the ticket agent, who, from his opposite window, had 
silently listened to the whole conversation. 

“ Won't there be a row when she sees ’em?" said he, be- 
hind his hand. 

“ You bet!" was the expressive answer of the ticket agent. 

Meanwhile Miss Avenel, panting up the steep and narrow 
stairway, slowly gained the upper floor. 

The room was entirely bare, with the sunset brilliance 
streaming on the rough board floor from two uncurtained 
west windows, and in its center were piled up one or two nar- 
row, oblong boxes, which looked as if they might contain pict- 
ures, a square case, labeled “ Books," and three or four worn 
trunks plastered over with numberless labels of hotels, for- 
eign and native; while on one of these trunks sat two young 
girls of twelve and thirteen, pale and weary-looking, and 
covered with the dust of travel, with a forlorn cockatoo 
perched on the shoulder of one. 

Lottie and Victorine Avenel. 

“ Mercy upon us!" ejaculated Miss Joanna, in her conster- 
nation retreating backward, so that she nearly pushed Mr. 
Philo Spelman down the stairs. “ Who are these girls? What 
does this mean?" 

“ Didn't 1 tell you you'd be astonished," said Mr. Watkins, 
the agent, who had by this time followed them up into the 
room. “ Never got such a start in my life as when 1 seen 
'em step out of the car with the express tickets tied around 
their necks, like they was a hamper of California pears or a 
box of croquet. I've seen dogs and monkeys come that way, 
and once there was a grizzly bear sent in a cage for old Abe 
Bellows's travelin' circus, but I'm blest if ever I had human 
creeturs consigned to me afore." 

Miss Avenel stood stricken dumb. Mr. Philo Spelman 
stared as if every perceptive faculty were condensed into the 
one sense of sight — and Lottie, rising from her seat, came 
timidly forward. 

“ Are you my aunt Joanna?" said she. “lam Charlotte 
— and this is my sister Victorine." 

“ Oh, Aunt Joanna!" cried out Victorine, with quivering 
lower lip and eyes brimming over -with tears, “papa is 
drowned in the Falls of Montmorenci, and we are all alone in 
the world! Will you be good to us?" 


: ' , ■ ■ . • .■ ' fi 


28 LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 

“ Stop! hold on!” said Miss Joanna, motioning Victorine 
to pause, as she was hurrying toward her with outstretched 
arms. “ Let me sense matters a little. It's like a thunder- 
clap. I never knew my brother had any girls. And — and 
he expected 1 was goin’ to take J em.” 

“ We’re very sorry,” said Victorine, the tears of mortifica- 
tion streaming down her cheeks, “ but we’ve nowhere else to 
go.” 

“ Mr. Hyde said you would be glad to see us,” added Lot- 
tie, in a choked voice. 

“ I don’t know who Mr. Hyde is, nor what authority he had 
to make such a speech as that,” said Miss Avenel, drawing 
herself up, and becoming colder and harder with every second. 

“ Oh, now, Miss Joanna, don’t!” said the express agent, 
pitying the mute misery and consternation expressed on the 
faces of the two children. “ Poor little orphan creatures! 
Speak kindly to ’em! Tell ’em you’re glad to see ’em!” 

“Just you have the kindness to mind your own business. 
Bill Watkins,” said Miss Avenel, turning short and sharp 
upon the tactless mediator. “ I guess me and Mr. Spelman is 
quite competent to attend to our affairs without none o’ your 
help.” 

But at this juncture Mr. Spelman himself, who had been 
for the last few minutes staring at the children with a curi- 
ous, spasmodic motion of the muscles of his throat, as if he 
were endeavoring to swallow what children call “a frog,” 
stepped into the middle of the room, and spoke his mind with 
extreme plainness and brevity. 

“ Now, look here,” said Mr. Spelman. “ Now you’ve men- 
tioned my name, Joanna Avenel, I may as well say what’s my 
sentiments on this here question. And that is, that I don’t 
want my name brung into the affair, either one way or the 
other. I don’t want nothin’ to do with this consarn. I’m a 
plain, straightforward man myself, and I don’t want no 
double-dealin’ with others. It ain’t my style. When I asked 
you to marry me, Joanna Avenel, I didn’t expect no ready- 
made family like this to be throwed into the bargain. Nor I 
didn’t want ’em! I’m a quiet, peaceable man, as ain’t no- 
ways fond of children, and I can’t stand ’em knockin’ and 
bangin’ around, like Bedlam broke loose. So I guess, Joanna 
Avenel, considerin’ all things, we’ll just close up our little 
account and declare off.” 

“ But, Philo—” 

“ There ain’t no buts in the matter,” persisted the refrac- 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE 


2 $ 

tory swain. “ 1 was willin' to marry you — but I don't feel 
called upon to marry all creation." 

Miss Joanna's eyes lightened with rage— she set her teeth 
together in a manner that convinced Mr. Philo Spelman that 
she might have given him more trouble than he had any idea 
of, after the matrimonial knot was tied. 

“ Philo Spelman," said she, “ you're a sneak and a cow- 
ard!" 

“ Them's actionable words," feebly croaked the recreant 
lover. 

“ And if the good Lord had made me a man, I'd kick you 
down them stairs," added Miss Joanna, with a step in his 
direction that made Mr. Spelman involuntarily jump back- 
ward. 

“ Land o' Goshen! what a temper the woman has got!" 
muttered Mr. Spelman, keeping an eye on the exact locality 
of the stairs, in case any sudden retreat should become neces- 
sary. 

“ Just look at him," said Miss Joanna, crooking her finger 
in his direction, with the extremest scorn. “ Yes, that's 
right! Clear out as quick as you can. There he goes, sneak- 
in' away like a whipped cur. That's one of the lords of crea- 
tion, that is!" 

And Mr. Spelman made his retreat, painfully conscious of 
the only partially suppressed laughter of the express and 
ticket agents, the wonder of the children, and the derisive re- 
gards of Miss Joanna Avenel. 

“ Guess you're well rid of him. Miss Avenel," said the ex- 
press man. “ The Spelmans always was the meanest lot in 
town, and Philo was the meanest of the lot!" 


CHAPTER VI. 

MR. SPELMAN TRIES IT AGAIN. 

But to this well -in tended item of consoling information 
Miss Joanna Avenel paid no attention whatever. She was 
standing gnawing her lower lip and gazing intently out of the 
opposite window, from which she could still see the form of 
her late lover striding away down the high-road — and not un- 
til it was out of sight did she turn once more to Lottie and 
Victorine, who had listened with childish, wondering eyes and 
palpitating hearts to the words which had just been spoken, 
and were mutely awaiting what should next transpire. Poor 
little creatures! Wearied, frightened, terribly alone, and un- 


30 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


able to avoid seeing how utterly unwelcome they were to their 
only living relative, they scarcely knew which way to turn. 

“ So you are Percy's children?" said Miss Avenel, suddenly 
fixing her keen gray eyes on them. “ Where's your mother?" 

“ She died in Portland ten years ago," Lottie answered, in 
a low voice. 

“ In Portland, Maine?" 

Lottie nodded. 

“ Humph!" said Miss Avenel. “ And Percy never even 
took the trouble to tell me he was married. Percy Avenel all 
over! ’Never knew him to think of any one but himself." 

Victorine lifted her soft blue eyes entreatingly to the 
spinster's hard face. 

“ Aunt Joanna," said she, “ papa is dead!" 

Miss Avenel uttered a short, uncompromising snort. 

“ What's your name?" said she, with a brusque motion of 
the head toward the taller of the two girls. 

“ Charlotte." 

“ And yours?" to Victorine. 

“ Victorine, ma'am." 

“ How old are you?" 

“lam twelve, and Lottie is thirteen." 

“ Good gracious!" commented Miss Avenel. “ Plenty old 
enough to earn your own living. Why, I did all the house- 
work when I was thirteen, and took care of three cows into 
the bargain. Can you work?" 

Victorine looked at Lottie. Lottie hesitated an instant, 
and then answered: 

“ Nobody ever showed us how, ma'am." 

“ My lands!" ejaculated Miss Avenel. “A pretty bring- 
ing up you must have had! And pray, may I ask what you 
did with all your precious time?" 

“ We used to walk out with other girls. Aunt Joanna, and 
read, and play with Pearlie. " 

“ With— who?" 

“ With Pearlie. The cockatoo, you know." 

“ Humph!" said Miss Avenel. “ Very profitable methods 
of employment. But I don't know as I’d ought to expect 
anything else from Percy Avenel's girls. Well, put on your 
hats. I s'pose I'll have to take you home with me." 

And Lottie and Victorine, who, during all the weary rail- 
way journey, had beguiled their fatigue by picturing to them- 
selves a soft-voiced, kind-hearted lady, who would weep with 
them over their cruel bereavement, and welcome them with 
the tenderness of a second mother, silently obeyed. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


31 


44 As for them other things. Bill Watkins,” said Miss Ave- 
nel, turning to the agent, “'.I'll send a wagon for 'em to-mor- 
row. They'll do for fire- wood, if for nothing else, and I guess 
that’s all they'll be worth. Charlotte,” wheeling suddenly 
around on her elder niece, 4 4 what are you going to do with 
that squawkin' bird?” 

44 1 am going to take him with me. Aunt Joanna.” 

44 No, you're not,” said Aunt Joanna. 44 1 don't want no 
such outlandish creeturs around.” 

44 But, Aunt Joanna, he's mine. And I love him! And I 
can't be parted from him,” faltered Lottie, folding her arms 
around Pearl, who nestled close up to her cheek, with a low, 
contented croak, and rubbed his crest against her lips. 

44 Stuff and nonsense!” said Miss Avenel. 44 Give him to 
me.” 

She seized Pearl by one leg— Lottie held tight on to him — 
and the cockatoo, somehow divining that he must take his lit- 
tle mistress's part, uttered a shrill cry, and made a savage 
bite at Miss Avenel' s hand. 

44 Pearl, Pearl, you shouldn't do that!” cried poor Lottie. 
44 Oh, Aunt Joanna, 1 hope he hasn't hurt you!” 

44 He has hurt me,” Miss Avenel slowly answered, glancing 
at the blood that was beginning to trickle down over the palm 
of her hand. 44 But he won't do it again. Give him to me, 
Charlotte, 1 say.” 

And Lottie, not daring further to resist, obeyed. 

44 Here, Bill Watkins!” said the lady, 44 take this bird.” 

44 And what am I to do with it?' asked Bill, half unwillingly 
receiving the white cockatoo into his hand. 

44 Wring its neck,” said Miss Avenel, briefly. 

Lottie and Victorine burst into tears and sobs at these 
words. 

44 Don't you be afraid, gals, don't you be afraid,” said 
good-natured Bill, smoothing down the ruffled feathers of 
poor Pearl, who clung to his finger as if by bird instinct he 
recognized a friend. 44 1 wouldn't hurt him for nothin'. I'll 
take him home to my wife; it's only a step or two down the 
road to the paper mill. She's fond of pets, and she'll set 
store by him, and you can come down and see him whenever 
you've a mind to. ” 

44 Do what you please with the creetur', so you keep him 
out of my way,” said Miss Avenel, grimly, while Lottie and 
Victorine bade their feathered favorite good-bye, with many 
tears and kisses. 

44 Is it a long walk, Aunt Joanna?” Victorine ventured to 


32 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


ask when they had turned the bend of the road and lost 
sight of the little railway station. 

“Not very far,” said Miss Avenel, who stalked on ahead, 
with the firm tread and upright bearing of a female grena- 
dier. “ And if it was, it wouldn't make any difference as far 
as we are concerned. We don't keep no carriage.” 

“ Victorine,'' whispered Lottie, as Miss Joanna strode on, 
“ our aunt speaks very bad grammar — not like papa.” 

“ Hush!” retorted Victorine, in the same tone of voice. 
“Perhaps she didn't have such a good education as papa. 
And, besides, you ought to know that it isn't polite to whis- 
per. ” 

“ I don't think she's glad to see us,” added Lottie, sadly. 

“ Nor I either,” faltered poor Victorine. “ But where else 
could we go?” 

And the wild roses along the lane seemed to swim and 
quiver in the tears that blinded Victorine's eyes. 

“ Don't cry, Vic,” whispered Lottie, winding her arm lov- 
ingly around her sister's slim waist. “ It's only for a little 
while. We'll soon be big and old enough to earn our own 
living.” 

While this piteous little colloquy was going on in the rear. 
Miss Avenel walked courageously on. At first she had almost 
resolved to take another and a somewhat longer route home, 
in order to avoid the gantlet of the Van Vorst eyes. But 
Miss Avenel, with all her failings, was not devoid of moral 
courage. 

“ Pshaw!” muttered she between her teeth, “ 1 won't be 
such a fool! I hain't lived neighbor to the Van Vorsts for 
seven-and-forty years to be afraid of 'em now!” 

And she resolutely took the turning which led past the very 
citadel of the enemy. 

It was a lovely sylvan spot, soft, green turf growing, like a 
carpet of emerald velvet, on either side of the road, and great 
elms interlacing their umbrageous boughs overhead. To the 
right and the left extended green meadows and cultivated 
fields, and the scattered farm-houses each had their door- 
yards full of pinks, verbenas, and roses. The sun had already 
set, but the west was all orange and crimson, and the balmy 
air was loaded with summer scents. 

“ Oh, how pretty it all is!” said Lottie, drawing a long 
breath of delight. - “1 wonder which of these houses is Aunt 
Joanna's?” 

Miss Avenel never turned her head to the right nor to the 
left as they passed the Van Vorst house, nevertheless she was 


LOTTIE AtfD VICTORINE. 


33 


quite conscious — by a sort of magnetic rapport , perhaps — that 
Mrs. Van Vorst and Miss Melissa Ann had had their num- 
bers re-enforced . by a third person, during the last hour, and 
that that third person was no other than Mr. Philo Spelman. 

“i don’t care,” said Miss Avenel to herself. ‘‘Let him 
go where he pleases.” 

But this was not strictly veracious. Miss Avenel did care. 
And the bitterest drop in the cup of her desertion was the 
consciousness that the recreant swain had fallen into the 
clutches of the Van Vorsts. 

It was quite true. Mr. Spelman’s first sensation, as he 
emerged from the railway station, was a sentiment of un- 
mingled exultation in his freedom. He had never been the 
most demonstrative and blissful of lovers, having felt all 
along, to use his own expression, that he had been “ nagged into 
it,” and the consciousness of relief was most welcome. But,* 
as the escaped prisoner of the Bastile came creeping back to 
his cell and humbly begged to have the key turned once more 
upon him, so Mr. Spelman found himself unable, on mature 
reflection, to entirely forego his prospects of matrimony. 

“ I’ve engaged the Baptist minister,” said Mr. Spelman, 
checking off a series of facts on the fingers of his left hand, 
“ and I’ve told every one I was going to be married — and I’ve 
bought a brand-new suit of clothes and three new shirts. 
It’ll never do to back out now. The very boys’ll hoot arter 
me on the streets. I must marry somebody .” 

And just as Mr. Spelman’s mind was traveling over a list 
of eligible single females of the vicinity, he heard a voice cry- 
ing out: 

“Goodness me, Mr. Spelman! what have you done with 
Miss Joanna Avenel?” 

And looking up, he found himself just opposite the garden 
gate of the Van Vorsts, and within full range of Miss Melissa 
Ann’s porcelain-blue eyes. 

“ Won’t you come in?” said that damsel, with a seductive 
smile. “ You do look so tired and warm.” 

“ Well, I don’t care if 1 do,” said Mr. Spelman, taking off 
his hat, -and wiping his perspiring brow with a three-foot- 
square bandana pocket-handkerchief. 

It was the perpetually recurring version of the old ballad: 

“ ‘ Will you walk into my parlor?’ 

Said the Spider to the Fly. ’ ’ 

Mr. Spelman knew perfectly well the risk he was incurring, 
yet he “ walked in,” and let Mrs. Van Vorst take his hat and 
Miss Melissa, his cane. 


u 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


And before he left the house he was engaged, hard and fast, 
for the second time — engaged, this time, to Miss Melissa Ann 
Van Vorst. 


CHAPTER VII. 

AN OLD ENEMY REAPPEARS. 

The life of Lottie and Victorine Avenel in its new channel 
was as unlike that to which they had hitherto been accus- 
tomed as is the existence of a caged linnet to the free world 
of woods and sky. The sort of career which had, almost by 
necessity, been marked out for Percy AvenePs daughters, had 
been objectless and irregular. Sometimes settled in cheap 
lodgings, sometimes in expensive hotels — occasionally dwell- 
ing like young Bedouin Arabs, on the decks of steamers, and 
the close, dusty compartments of railway cars, always hold- 
ing themselves in readiness to furl their tents and receive 
marching orders at the shortest notice, they had no more idea 
of habit or system than a pair of wild birds. 

And Miss Joanna, whose narrow views of life were all cast 
in the grooves of habit and regularity, regarded them with a 
surprise which she took no pains whatsoever to conceal. 

“ One would think you were absolute heathens,” she said. 
“ I might as well have two china dolls around, for all the use 
you are to me. Just look at those windows! As muddy and 
cloudy as if you’d thrown dish-water on ’em!” 

“ But, Aunt Joanna,” pleaded Lottie, with a countenance 
flushed by exertion, and her dress liberally splashed over the 
front, “I never washed windows before. No one ever told 
me how.” 

“ Land’s sake alive!” said Miss Avenel; ‘ k as if a body need 
to go to school to learn to wash windows! Why, you ought 
to know by instinct!” 

“ I put in plenty of soap,” said Lottie, gazing piteously at 
the bleared and murky windows. 

“ Soap!” echoed Miss Avenel. “ Soap! Charlotte,” with 
a venomous emphasis on the last syllable of the name, “ how 
old are you?” 

“ 1 am thirteen, Aunt Joanna.” 

“ Thirteen! Most a woman, and not to know that you 
should never wash windows with soap-suds! I’ve no patience 
with you. Now, go and pitch that pail of stuff into the back 
yard, and draw some clean water.” 

“ Put, Aunt Joanna, I am so tired,” pleaded Lottie, wiping 
her wet brow with the hem of her apron. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


35 


“ Can’t help that/’ said Miss Joanna. “ Them windows 
has got to be washed clean before you leave off. 1 never did 
see such shiftlessness. And Victorine’s every bit as bad. I 
sent her to the barn this morning for eggs, and she just went 
to the barn door and looked around, as if she expected to see 
a row of nests just in front of the threshold, and then she 
came back and told me there wa’n’t none there.” 

“ AVell, but. Aunt Joanna,” put in Victorine, who, with a 
prodigious apron made of bed-ticking tied all around her, was 
cleaning silver spoons, “ how was 1 to know that the hens hid 
their eggs off in the hay? No one ever told me!” 

Miss Avenel deigned no reply, but whisked off into the 
kitchen with a snorting sound which expressed infinite disdain 
and contempt, and Victorine burst into tears. 

“ Don’t cry, Vic, dear,” said Lottie, setting down her pail 
and giving her sister a hug which covered her with soapy 
water. 

“ I can’t help it,” faltered Victorine. “ She’s always 
scolding — and we can’t please her, do what we will. Lottie,” 
in a tremulous whisper, “ 1 think she hates us.” 

“ Think!” repeated Lottie. “ I’ve no sort of doubt on the 
subject. I know she hates us. And I hate her.” 

“ Lottie!” 

“ So I do,” said Lottie. “ A cross, snarling old maid, with 
a heart like a stone, and all the milk of human kindness 
turned to bonny-clabber. This is the way she walks across 
the kitchen floor.” 

And Lottie pursed up her cherry lips, drew her pretty 
brows into a comical net-work of wrinkles, and made a scud 
across the room, her head thrust forward, and her apron 
strings streaming behind like the pennons of a yacht in a high 
wind. Victorine burst out laughing — she could not help it. 

“ Of course 1 hate her,” went on Lottie, breathless from 
her accurate imitation of Aunt Joanna’s nimble gait. c ‘ If 
she ever smiled at us, or spoke kindly to us, or had a kind 
word to say of poor dear papa, I’d love her with all my 
heart. But she never does. Never mind, Vicky. When 
I’ve cleaned these beastly windows, and you’ve scoured those 
spoons so that that old cat can see her wrinkles in ’em, we’ll 
go up into the woods and gel some of those lovely green ferns 
that look like little banners.” 

Which brief conversation will accurately express the exact 
state of feeling between Miss Joanna Avenel and her nieces. 

Miss Avenel had always disliked her brother Percy, to be- 
gin with; she hated children, to end with; and to have the 


36 


LOTTIE AND Y1CTOR1NE. 


peaceful monotony of her daily existence broken in upon by 
these two untrained, untaught young girls, who were not 
likely to be anything but a trouble and an expense for years 
to come, required considerably more Christian patience than 
she possessed. Moreover, had it not been for Lottie and Vie- 
torine. Miss Joanna reflected, with a bitterness past all ex- 
pression, she would have been Mrs. Philo Spelman by this 
time, instead of the disappointed rival of Miss Melissa Ann 
Van Vorst. 

“IPs too much for human natur’," said Miss Joanna to 
herself, grinding her teeth as she splashed away in a pan of 
boiling-hot dish-water. “Not that Philo Spelman was such 
a precious catch in himself; but to have him fall right into 
-.Melissy Ann Van Vorst's jaws with the weddin'-gownd all 
ready, and the cake baked. And she to have the impudence 
to send over for my dress patterns to cut out her things! I 
told her I was usin' 'em, and so I was. 1 used 'em in the 
next half hour to kindle the kitchen fire. But there ain't no 
bound to some folks' assurance. And now, here 1 am, with 
Percy's two great lazy gals saddled on me for the next ten 
years, for all that 1 can see. But I'll make 'em earn their 
livin' before they're many months older, or my name ain't 
Joanna Avenel." 

While these by no means consolatory reflections were pass- 
ing through the mind of the deserted bride, her two nieces, 
temporarily released from the odious thralldom of potato peel- 
ing and knife cleaning, were wandering gleefully about in the 
woods, uttering exclamations of renewed delight at every 
thicket of crimson-hearted wild roses, every bush of scented 
azalea and tuft of tall, red lilies, nodding in the soft June 
breeze. Lottie sprung about her hands loaded with flowers, 
her hat stuck full of delicate ferns, whistling like a black- 
bird, while Victorine, quieter, yet not less intensely happy, 
sat on a moss-enameled bowlder and gazed up into the green 
awning of trees overhead. 

“ Oh, Lottie!" she said, “ this is prettier than Quebec." 

“ Isn't it, though?" said Lottie. “ And, oh! Vic, there's 
such a patch of violets just beyond the stone wall yonder. 
Let's climb over and get them." 

“ Aunt Joanna said we weren't to go beyond the wall," 
said Victorine, dubiously. 

“ 1 can't help that," retorted lawless Lottie. “ I must and 
will have those violets!" 

“ But, perhaps," persisted Victorine, catching at. the skirt 
of her sister's dress, “ there are dogs there." 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


37 


“ Dogs, indeed ! Who's afraid of dogs?" laughed Lottie. 
“1 never yet saw the dog that I couldn't make friends with." 

And she scrambled ovei the fence, as light and quick as one 
of the little striped squirrels who, from the tree-trunks above, 
were watching her with their sparkling black beads of eyes. 
Victorine followed. She would scarcely have scaled the fence 
by herself, but she imitated Lottie's bolder example in this, 
as in all other things. 

“ It’s a great deal nicer over here," said Lottie. “ Look 
at that beautiful clematis vine. And, oh! the violets! And 
there's a little brook down in the hollow. Vic, let's go and 
paddle our feet in it." 

As they rushed through the woods, turning suddenly 
around a bend in the bushes, they came unexpectedly face to 
face with a tall boy in a brown linen suit, with a lishing-pole 
over his shoulder, and a flat basket slung across his back. 

“ Halloo!" said the boy, stopping suddenly. “ Who-o-oa! 
Don't quite run a fellow down! Whew! if it ain't little 
Quebec!" 

“And," cried out Lottie, breathlessly, “you're the boy 
that knocked my hat off, on Durham Terrace." 

“ Served you right, too," said the boy, with a chuckle at 
the recollection of his prowess. “ What are you doing here. 
I'd like to know?" 

“ I don't think that’s any of your -business," said Lottie, 
who still preserved a lively recollection of her injuries upon 
that memorable occasion, scarcely three weeks ago. Ah! 
what an age it seemed now! 

“ But it is, though!" said the boy. “ These happen to be 
private grounds." 

“ Private grounds?" repeated Lottie. 

“ Yes," nodded the boy. “ Man traps and spring guns! 
Trespassers prosecuted according to law!" 

“ 1 don't understand you,” said Lottie, wonderingly. 

“ Clear out!" said the boy. “ Skedaddle! Is that plain 
enough for your comprehension,, Miss Quebec? These are my 
father's grounds. My father is Squire Fordham, and he 
don't allow all the rag-tag and bobtail in creation scampering 
over his property." 

“ Yon are a very rude boy," said Lottie. “We are doing 
no harm." 

“I don't care whether you are or not," said the boy. 
“ Clear off, 1 say, or I’ll whistle up the dogs." 

“ Would you be coward enough to set the dogs on two help- 


38 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


less girls?” passionately demanded Lottie, still maintaining 
her ground. 

“Yes, I would,” said Master Fordham; “as you'll find 
out to your cost, if you don't step pretty lively. Here, 
Caesar! Don!” 

“ Oh, Lottie, don't let's stay here to be worried by the 
dogs!” cried out Victorine, seizing her sister's dress, and 
hurrying her away— and neither stopped until they had once 
more climbed the stone wall, and stood panting on the other 
side of its mossy crest. 

Master Frank Fordham had followed, skillfully imitating 
the barking of a dog as he did so, and contorting himself with 
laughter as he observed how much this maneuver accelerated 
the pace of the two terrified little fugitives. But he stopped 
when he came to the stone wall, and leaning his two elbows 
on its top, ran out his tongue in insolent fashion at Lottie 
and Victorine. 

“ What fools girls are!” said he. “ There isn't a dog 
nearer than the gardener’s house, three quarters of a mile 
away.” 

“ Then,” said Lottie, “ you're a mean, hateful boy for 
frightening us so.” 

And she looked wrathfully around at Victorine, who sat 
panting on the ground, scarcely able to recover her breath 
from the haste she had made. 

“ Wasn't it fun?” said the boy, relieving his surplus ener- 
gies by a series of hideous grimaces. “ I say, you would both 
have made tip-top racers. I wish I'd had my watch along to 
have timed you.” 

Lottie, made no answer. 

“ You're the two girls that scrub floors and wash dishes for 
Old Maid Avenel, aren't you?” went on the boy, staring lei- 
surely from one to the other. “ It's your afternoon out, 1 
suppose?” 

“ If you don't leave off talking so impudently,” said Lot- 
tie, “ I'll — I'll throw a stone at you.” 

“ Let's see you do it,” said Master Fordham, with a defiant 
grin. “ I never saw a girl yet that could aim straight.” 

Driven to extremity by the taunt, Lottie Avenel caught up 
a stone that had slipped down from its niche in the wall, and 
flung it with all her might at Frank Fordham. Despite his 
assertion, it grazed his forehead, drawing blood. He turned 
very pale, and drawing out a fine cambric pocket-handker- 
chief, scented with Jockey Club perfume, applied it to his 
brow. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


39 


“ Little savage!” he uttered between his teeth. “ Just see if 
Pm not revenged for this!” 

But Lottie scarcely waited to hear his words. Catching Vie- 
torine by the hand, the two girls ran headlong down the 
wooded slope, bounding like young does over the uneven 
ground, and never pausing until they were safe in the apple 
orchard that was .only a few fields from Miss AvenePs door. 
Here they paused and looked at each other, half frightened, 
half exultant. 

“ Lottie, you served him just right,” said Victorine. 

“ Didn’t I, though!” said Lottie. 

But neither of them told their afternoon’s adventure to 
Aunt Joanna. 


CHAPTER VIII. 

GRAPES AND APRICOTS. 

Among the daily tasks obnoxious to the souls of Lottie and 
Victorine Avenel, which Miss Joanna insisted upon with an 
inexorable regularity which was as punctual and unavoidable 
as the diurnal rising and setting of the sun, was an hour of 
sewing. Sometimes it was hemming kitchen towels, some- 
times making over sheets, ripping them down the middle and 
turning them thriftily side for side, so that they should wear 
the longer — sometimes the manufacture of the bed-tick aprons 
which were worn to preserve their outer clothing in the busi- 
ness of dish-washing, cleaning floors, and rinsing clothes, and 
sometimes a hideous piece of patch-work in glaring colors, 
which Miss Joanna called her “log-cabin pattern.” Neither 
of the girls was particularly quick or skillful at her needle, 
and many a crimson spot on the material betokened punctured 
fingers, to say nothing of the frequent tears dropped into the 
intricacies of the “ log-cabin pattern.” 

“No use a-cryin’ or hangin’ back!” said Miss Joanna, 
resolutely. “ You’ve got to learn, and that’s all there is to 
it!” 

But one afternoon, as Victorine brought her completed task 
for the inspection of Miss Avenel, she ventured to ask a ques- 
tion which had for some time been agitating her mind, as well 
as that of her sister. 

“ Aunt Joanna,” said she, “ is this hem done neatly?” 

“ It’s pretty well,” said Miss AVenel, after a sharp and 
critical survey, during which she had failed to detect a single 
fault. “ Pretty well. But you’ve been a long time about it.” 


40 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


For it was against Miss Avenel ’s principles ever to accord 
unqualified praise upon any occasion whatsoever. 

“ I sewed as quick as I Could,” said Victorine. , 

“ You must learn to be a little spryer,” said Miss Avenel. 
“ I guess 1 shall take in a contract of boot finishing this fall. 
You girls may as well begin to earn your own living now as 
any time.” 

“ What is boot finishing?” asked Lottie, looking wearily 
up from her own unfinished strip of hemming. 

“ You’ll find out time enough,” said Miss Avenel. “ Good 
hard sewing, and plenty of it. There’s no sense in you two 
great girls idling around all the time. 

“ ‘ Satan finds some mischief still 
For idle hands to do. ’ 

That’s my experience. ” 

v But, Aunt Joanna,” tremulously spoke Victorine, 
“ aren’t you going to send us to school?” 

“ To school!” repeated Miss Joanna, bending her brows in 
an awful frown. “ No, I’m not!” 

“ Why not. Aunt Joatfha?” 

“ Costs too much,” said Miss Avenel, briefly, as she bit off 
a needleful of thread. 

“But, Aunt Joanna,” argued Lottie, “ the district schools 
cost nothing. And we could learn lots of things there.” 

“ Yes,” said Miss Joanna, with a bitter inflection in her 
voice, “ and leave me all alone at home to cook and clean 
after you, and wait on you. That would be a very fine plan, 
wouldn’t -it?” 

Lottie and Victorine sat silent, with disappointed faces and 
eyes brimming with tears. “ No,” went on Miss Avenel, 
speaking the cruel little monosyllable with an emphasis as if 
it were a bullet fired from a gun; “you’ve just got to 
buckle down to hard work, you two girls, and the sooner you 
understand all about it the better. I’m not rich enough to 
keep a free hotel for two fine young ladies, even if I had the 
inclination, which 1 haven’t. Perhaps you don’t know how 
much your clothes and board cost a year?” 

“ Papa never told us,” said Lottie, with cheeks deep dyed 
with mortification. 

“ I dare say not,” said Miss Joanna. “It never was my 
brother Percy’s way to systematize anything. Run up a long 
bill and then run off and leave it! That was the easiest way. 
And here’s where it ends — in his girls living on charity.” 




LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 41 

“ Aupt Joanna!” pried out Lottie, springing to her feet, 
with glittering eyes and palpitating heart. 

“Just you be quiet, will you ?” said Miss Avenel, motion- 
ing the young girl back to her seat. “ There’s no use flying 
out at facts. All I want you to understand is that you’ve got 
your living to earn, and the sooner you set about it the bet- 
ter. Shoe-finishing isn’t a bad business — until 1 can hear of 
some good, stirring trade to bind you both apprentices to.” 

Lottie and Victorine looked blankly at each other; and that 
evening — after the tea-dishes were cleared away and washed, 
and they had obtained reluctantly granted leave to walk down 
to the station and visit their friend, the cockatoo, who was 
enjoying life very much as the pet of the three little Watkins 
children, and, to the infinite chagrin of Lottie and Victorine, 
grad ually forgettingfall about his former mistresses as fast as 
possible — they discussed this new and unpleasant phase of 
affairs. 

“ Only think of it, Lottie!” said Victorine. “ We shall 
grow up without learning anything! Think of living a life 
just like Aunt Joanna’s! She never reads, she never cares 
about what is happening in all the great, wide world around 
her; she never thinks of anything but sewing patch- work and 
making so many pounds of butter a week! And if the milk- 
room shelves were not scoured off every Thursday morning by 
ten o’clock, she’d think it a great deal more dreadful than if 
there should be an earthquake somewhere. Oh, Lottie, shall 
we ever be like that?” 

“ Shall we ever turn into stupid, senseless logs of wood?” 
incredulously counter-questioned Lottie. ‘ No, Vic, we 
never shall be like that. It isn’t our natures. I mean to be 
a lady one of these days, as our papa’s daughter ought to be. 
And so shall you, Vicky darling.” 

“ But how?” 

“ I don’t know quite how,” said Lottie, “ but it’ll come to 
me one of these days. Here’s the garden gate, and there’s 
dear old Peariie croaking in his cage at the kitchen window. 
Pearl! Peariie! Oh, you’re only a bird, and you don’t know 
what a changed world this is for us!” 

She took the bird caressingly into her arms, and a tear 
dropped on liis glossy head as she bent over him — a tear which 
Victorine did not see. For, in spite of the brave front which 
she sedulously maintained before her sister, Lottie had her 
moods of doubt and despondency at times. 

It was nearly dark when the two girls left the Watkins’ 
house to return home— dark, with a drizzly rain beginning to 



42 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


fall, and an east wind blowing raw and damp from the 
Sound. And the next morning Victor in& woke up with a sore 
throat and racking headache. 

“ She's going to have a fever,'' said Miss Joanna, who was 
not unacquainted with the forms and primary symptoms of 
disease. 

“ A fever!" cried Lottie, in dismay. “ Oh, Aunt Joanna! 
will she die?" 

“Not she," said Miss Avenel, impatiently, shaking off the 
unconscious clutch of Lottie's hand on her arm. “ She's as 
tough as a pine knot — the regular Avenel constitution — but, 
oh, dear! what a job I'm going to have nursing her! What 
did Percy Avenel want to drown himself for, and leave all this 
business on my hands?" 

Lottie never answered — it was a question if she heard her 
aunt's unfeeling Words. Victorine had always been her life 
companion, her second self. All her vague ideas of the great, 
boundless future were associated with Victorine; and the 
frightful possibility of life without Victorine sent a chill of 
nameless horror through all her veins. 

“ Will she die? will she die?" she kept on repeating, until 
Miss Avenel threatened to exclude her altogether from the 
sick-room, unless, as she curtly expressed it, “ she could show 
more common sense." And then Lottie promised, with many 
tears, and a face of pale, drawn misery, to do whatever they 
told her, if only she might be permitted to remain in the 
same room with her sick sister. 

Fortunately the fever soon ran its course, and Victorine be- 
gan slowly to mend. But, oh! the unutterable weariness, the 
dreary monotony of convalescence in Miss Joanna Avenel's 
nine-by-nine square bedroom, with not a book but the Bible, 
Watts' Hymns, and “One Hundred Receipts for Cooking " 
in the house. Day after day Victorine lay there, counting, 
first one way and then the other, the great pink roses on the 
wall-paper, wondering why the patch was set so crookedly on 
the white cotton window-curtain, and pining after a thousand 
unattainable things. 

Of all these, a longing for fruit was the most constant of 
her cravings. Flushed and languid she lay there, fancying 
the touch of tropic juices on her parched tongue, dreaming of 
piled - up oranges, creamy bananas, and crimson - cheeked 
peaches, until imagination became a positive pain, and she 
awaked from the brief delusion with, a sicklier intensity of 
longing than ever. 

“ Fudge!" was Miss Joanna's comment, when Lottie begged 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 43 

her to satisfy Victories desires. “It's all fancy. If she 
was to cry for the moon, would you expect me to get a ladder 
and climb up for it? She's doing well enough on her beef- 
tea and water gruel, and you may as well save your breath to 
cool your porridge when you ask for anything more." 

For Miss Joanna had no fruit on her place but winter apples 
and a few currants, which she had already made up into jelly; 
and as for spending hard cash in the purchase of any such 
superfluity, she would have regarded that as a sin indeed. 

“ Let folks cut their coat according to their cloth, and be 
satisfied with what they have, instead of making up mouths 
for what they can't get," said Miss Avenel. “That's my 
theory. And Victorine's just as well off as if she had all the 
white grapes and apricots up to Fordham Manor." 

“ Do they have grapes and apricots up there?" asked Lot- 
tie, wistfully. 

“ Yes, and every other expensive foolery that rich folks can 
afford to have," said Miss Joanna, sharply. 

“ Are there many children there?" asked Lottie. 

“ Frank and Sara — that's all." 

“ I wish I was rich," said Lottie. 

“ 1 wish I was an angel," said Miss Avenel. “ But I ain't 
— nor likely to be, so far as 1 can see. ‘ If wishes were horses, 
beggars would ride.' Now go and scour out the inside of all 
those milk-pans, and mind you don't slight 'em." 

“ But Victorine!" 

“ Victorine don't want watchin' the whole time," answered 
Miss Joanna. “ She won't run away. I'll go bail. I shall 
be right in the next room if she wants anything, and it's high 
time you began to make youfself useful again." 

But all the time that Lottie's busy fingers were brightening 
the glistening surface of the tin pans her brain was busy at 
work forming a little scheme for the behoof and benefit of 
sick Victorine. 

Fordham Manor, the great place of the neighborhood, was 
distant about three miles from the Avenel cottage by the 
high-road, and less than half that distance, as the crow flew, 
through the woods. Lottie had often viewed it from the 
great stone-pillared gates, a square, handsome house, with a 
wide portico in front, and two beautiful marble statues of 
Spring and Autumn on either side of the broad, circular car- 
riage-drive, that inclosed a fountain whose showers of spray 
fell with unceasing tinkle into a basin of calla-Iilies and broad- 
leaved hydrangeas. To Lottie it looked like a glimpse of some 
unattainable Eden, although she never ventured to feast her 


44 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


eyes upon it very long at a time, lest her old enemy Frank 
should suddenly burst out upon her. She had not seen him 
since the memorable occasion upon which her retributive 
stone had been flung with so true an aim; but she entertained 
a profound conviction that he would not fail to keep his word 
as regarded having his revenge for the drops of blood that 
well-directed missile had drawn. 

At the foot of the hill, at the back of the house, a range of 
greenhouses, graperies, and forcing- houses made a miniature 
colony of their own, and the gardener’s house was still further 
away, in the vicinity of the stables. Lottie knew the geog- 
raphy of the place quite well, and as she scoured away at the 
tin pans she resolved to go to the gardener of Fordham 
Manor and valiantly ask of him the tempting dainties for 
which Victorine longed so piteously. 

“ I don’t like to ask favors of any one, least of all those 
people at Fordham Manor,” thought Lottie; “ but it’s for 
Yic. And this morning, when 1 asked her why she was cry- 
ing so softly on her pillow, and she told me it was because she 
had been dreaming she had one of those red apricots we used 
to buy in Quebec, and waked up before she had a chance to 
bite into it, I did feel so sorry for her. Yic shall have her 
apricot, if there’s one ripe between here and New Haven.” 

And cheered by this prospect, Lottie sung so merrily at her 
work that Miss Avenel put her head into the room and asked 
“ if she meant to drive ’em all crazy?” 

That evening, when all the work was done, after tea, and 
Yictorine had fallen asleep after her dose of flavorless beef- 
tea, Lottie put on the gingham sun-bonnet which Aunt 
Joanna had ordained that she should wear, except on Sundays 
and high holidays, and crept across the woods where she had 
once walked with Yictorine, in the direction of Fordham 
Manor. 

It was now the last of J uly, bright, radiant summer weath- 
er, with the corn-fields nodding in the wind, and the wheat 
and barley already hanging their heads ripe for harvest. The 
blackbirds whistled sweetly in the trees, the squirrels darted 
through the woods, and the bright-eyed lizards on the trunks 
of fallen trees regarded her intently as she danced through 
the woods, and climbed the stone wall. 

“It’s only a step to the gardener’s house now,” she 
thought, “ and I’ll be back before Victorine has a chance to 
wake up. Won’t she be surprised and delighted when she 
smells the fruit on her pillow!” 

From which sanguine meditations it may be inferred that 


LOTTIE A HD VICTORIHE. 45 

Lottie entertained no sort of doubt as to the successful issue 
of her expedition. 

Two or three yelping little curs flew out at her as she neared 
the small Gothic cottage close to the stables, and a surly look- 
ing, elderly man, with a pipe in his mouth, came to the door, 
to see what occasioned their chorus of shrill barks. 

“ Eh?” said the elderly man. “ Who are you? What do 
you want? We don’t give nothin’ to tramps or beggars!” 

“I am not a tramp or a beggar,” said Lottie, indignantly 
— and then, remembering her mission, she stopped short. 

“What’s wantin’, then?” said the man. “Speak quick! 
I can’t stand here parleying all day.’ 7 

“ If you please, sir,” said Lottie, quite forgetting, in her 
trepidation, the little ingratiatory speech she had prepared in 
her mind, as she came skipping through the woods, “ are you 
the gardener?” 

“ Yes, I am.” 

“ And would you be so good as to give me a few grapes and 
apricots?” 

“ Grapes and apricots?” repeated the gardener, in accents 
of amazement. “ And what, in the name of common sense, 
would I be giving you grapes and apricots for?” 

“It’s for my sister,” said Lottie. “She has been very 
sick. And she does so long for fruit.” 

“ Then, why don’t you buy it for her?” asked the man. 

“Because I haven’t any money,” Lottie answered, with 
extreme frankness. 

“ That’s the very reason I can’t let you have it, neither,” 
answered the gardener, closing the door ruthlessly in her face. 
“ Get along with you! If we was to give away our hot-house 
fruit broadcast to every child that came here asking for it, 
how d’ye suppose we’d ever have any for ourselves? Eh?” 

“ But, sir—” 

“ No, I say, no /’’ reiterated the man— and Lottie could 
hear the sound of his 'footsteps receding briskly down the hall, 
while the curs still yelped and snarled around her feet. 

Poor, sanguine little Lottie! She turned away, bitterly 
chagrined and disappointed, a great lump rising in her throat, 
and a mist of angry tears obscuring her vision. 

“ Cross, hateful old tyrant!” she cried, aloud, shaking her 
small fist in the direction of the door. “ But I’ll have the 
grapes and apricots, see if 1 don’t! l r ll have ’em, in spite of 
you /” And yet, all this time, our little heroine was not alto- 
gether a savage, nor was she ignorant of the wide moral differ- 
ence between meum and tuum. It is true that she never had 


LOTTIE AND VICTOR INE. 


40 

received any of that tender, religious instruction which builds 
up an invisible yet impervious wall between the pure young 
soul and all life’s countless snares and temptations, but she 
had within her that instinctive sense of right and wrong which 
is God’s heritage to us all. But all this was warped and dis- 
torted by her keen sense of wrong and injustice, the great 
trouble that overhung her like a shadow. All that she could 
remember was Victorine, pining . on her sick-bed for the taste 
of fresh fruit, and the fact that the walls and graperies at 
Fordham Manor were festooned with a rich abundance, which 
nobody cared to pluck. It was one of the inscrutable life 
problems which Lottie’s slender experience was insufficient to 
solve, and which, with juvenile audacity, she resolved to set 
right for herself. 

“ I’ll have ’em anyhmv !” muttered Lottie. 

Creeping softly along in the shadow of the wall, she made 
her way toward the glittering arched roof of the line of 
graperies and greenhouses, which extended along the south 
wall, about an eighth of a mile distant from the gardener’s 
cottage. All was quiet and solitary. Her little enemies, the 
dogs, had slunk around to their kennels as soon as the intru- 
sive presence of the stranger was withdrawn, and the hum- 
ming of bees, the chirping of summer insects, and the far-off 
sound of cocks crowing in the barn-yard, was all that dis- 
turbed the silence. 

Presently she emerged from the shrubberies into the broad, 
level spot where the greenhouses were situated, with rainbow- 
tinted flower-beds around, and precise little gravel walks 
winding in and out, like the “ labyrinth ” puzzles which Lot- 
tie used to pore over as a child. Along the back a high brick 
wall extended, its crest protected by a cheval-de-frise of broken 
bottles and spikes. Close to this the glass-houses were built, 
and against its sunny exposure Lottie could perceive a luxuri- 
ance of purpling and crystal bunches of gigantic foreign 
grapes, half hidden among their leaves, while beyond, in the 
open air, a huge apricot-tree was trained, espalier fashion, its 
boughs tacked to the wall, a fan of gold and crimson fruit. 

Lottie’s eyes glittered — her heart throbbed in anticipatory 
triumph. Gathering her gingham apron into a sort of im- 
promptu bag in one hand, she gathered it full of apricots, 
glancing furtively around to make sure that she was not ob- 
served. 

“Oh, my!” she murmured softly to herself, “don’t they 
smell fragrant? And won’t Vic be glad when she sees them!” 

And then, slipping noiselessly through the unlocked grapery 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


47 


door, she found herself underneath the crystal arches of the 
glass-house, in an almost intolerably tropic atmosphere and a 
scent of ripening grapes. 

“ 1 should think the grapes couldn't help getting ripe here," 
said Lottie to herself. “ And what a quantity there is, to be 
sure. Shouldn't 1 like to eat 'em all! But I won't touch 
one — they're for poor sick Vicky." 

And Lottie held valiantly to her morsel of self-denial, never 
even tasting a grape or the roseate side of a single apricot. 
To appropriate anything for herself would have been, accord- 
ing to her code of morals, stealing — appropriating them for 
fever-smitten Victor ine was quite another thing. 

Bunch after bunch she gathered, some of bloomy blue, 
others of opaque greenish white, Chasselas and White Fron- 
tignac, great globes of honeyed sweetness — and, just as she 
was climbing up a sort of step-ladder to reach one last pendant 
of clustering purple, the last and the laigest, which was to 
complete her little store, a sharj) tapping against the glass 
without caused her nearly to fall from her height with the 
panic of terror. And, springing headlong down, still clinging 
desperately to her apron full of fruit, she found herself face 
to face with Master Frank Ford ham, who was flattening his 
nose against the door and making a series of hideous face sat 
her. 

“ I've caught you, have I?" said Frank. “ Caught you in 
the very act of — stealing!" 


CHAPTER IX. 

TAKEN PRISONER. 

“ I'm not stealing!" passionately exclaimed Lottie. 

“ What is it, then?" he sneered. 

“ I'm only taking a few grapes." 

“ Where’s the difference, 1 should like to know?" jeeringly 
demanded Master Fordham. 

‘*1—1 asked the gardener for 'em," cried out Lottie, her 
voice shrill, and quivering with the storm of emotion which 
was striving within her little breast, “and he wouldn't give 
'em to me. And they're for my sick sister. I haven't 
touched one myself. FTo, not one /" 

“ A very plausible story," said Frank, deliberately turning 
the key of the grapery door upon the terrified young captive. 
“ Only, you see. Miss Lottie Avenel, facts are facts, and 
here you are, steading my father's grapes as fast as you can 


48 


LOTTIE AtfD YICTORINE. 


haul them down off the wall. Don’t you know it’s a state 
prison offense?” 

“ I don’t believe a word of it/’ said Lottie, keeping up a 
show of great valor, although her heart sunk within ner. 

“ Nor I’m not by any means sure that it isn’t hanging!” 
went on Frank, maliciously enjoying the consternation he was 
creating. 

“ Let me out!” said Lottie, throwing herself against, the 
door with all her small might. “ Let me out, I say!” 

“ Let you out? Not just yet, I guess. Not until you go 
down on your knees, and beg my pardon for this and all the 
other impudences you’ve been guilty of toward me. Aha! 
you see I’ve not forgotten that stone yet.” 

“ I won’t!” flashed Lottie. 

“ You won’t, eh? Very well. That’s one more little item 
to add to your list of offenses. Good! I shall pay ’em all 
off with interest. How would you like to stay here all night?” 

You wouldn’t dare to keep me here all night!” breath- 
lessly exclaimed Lottie. 

“ Wouldn’t I, though? You’ll see!” retorted Frank, twist- 
ing a padlock through the staples on the opposite side of the 
door, as if he deemed lock and key scarcely security enough. 
“ Solitary confinement is what they give them in state prison, 
and you may as well get a little experience before you’re 
served up to seven years or so of it.” 

“ Let me out, I say!” cried Lottie, pale with passion and 
terror. 

“Not to-night, 1 guess,” said Frank, with a grin of satis- 
fied glee. 

“If you don’t. I’ll scream!” 

“ Scream away, then — it will be good for your lungs. No 
one can hear you but the gardener, and I’ll easily settle mat- 
ters with him. Didn’t 1 tell you I’d be revenged. Miss Que- 
bec? Didn’t I? Eh?” 

“ Frank Fordham, please let me out!” entreated Lottie. 
“ Yictorine will be so frightened if 1 don’t come home — and 
Victorine isn’t over the fever yet. Won’t you, Frank?” 

“ Now you’ve changed your tone,” said Frank Fordham, 
leaning against the door and nodding his head, as if to keep 
time to his words. “It’s all pleasant by way of variety. 
Beg away! cry away! You’ll be down on your knees pres- 
ently.” 

“ I’ll never do that!” vowed Lottie. “No, never /” 

“ It wouldn’t do you any good if you did, noiv !” said 
Frank. “ Because I’m not going to let you out, anyway! So, 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


49 


good -night, Miss Quebec! The sun is down, and the dew’s 
beginning to fall, and 1 may injure my precious health if I 
stay out any longer/’ 

And, with a hideous lolling out of his tongue at her, and a 
contortion of the features which he had once learned from the 
clown in a traveling circus. Master Fordham stalked away 
over the flower-beds, with his hands in his pockets, and pres- 
ently disappeared behind the drooping boughs of a cluster of 
tamarack-trees. 

Lottie, still holding tight to her apron full of fruit, stood 
looking after him, with a medley of strange feelings battling 
in her little heart. 

If it had not been for the thought of Victorine’s perplexity 
and distress at her unwonted absence, Lottie would have re- 
garded the whole thing as a first-class joke — an adventure 
almost equal to what she had read about in books. 

“ If only Vic wouldn’t cry,” she thought, slowly rubbing 
her hand over her forehead, a habit she had when in per- 
plexity, “ and Aunt Joanna wouldn’t find it out and scold 
me! 1 wonder if I couldn’t break through a piece of glass 
big enough for me to get out. I’m not very large, and I 
could crawl through a pretty small place.” 

But this faint hope was blighted in the bud, by perceiving 
that, as high as she could reach all around, a closely woven 
net, or screen of fine wire, covered the outside of the grapery, 
probably placed there as a protection against stray stones or 
missiles. Next she thought of mining her way out under the 
walls, but the stone foundations were too strong and closely 
laid for that. 

“ I guess I shall have to stay here all night,” thought Lot- 
tie, crouching down in a corner. “ It’s pretty hot, and my 
bones ache with the long walk, after all the house-work 1 did 
first. But 1 wouldn’t care if it wasn’t for Victorine.” 

As she sat there musing the sky overhead began to be dotted 
with stars, a cooler atmosphere stole through the ventilators 
in the roof, and Lottie, spite of her troubled meditation, be- 
gan to feel very drowsy. 

“I know 1 sha’n’t sleep in this strange place,” said Lottie 
to herself; “ but I’ll just close my eyes and rest a little.” 

And when she woke up the eastern sunshine of the early 
morning was streaming through the glass roof of her unwonted 
lodging-place. 

At first Lottie could hardly call to mind where she was, or 
how she came thither; but presently the tide of memory came 
surging back upon her brain with full force, and with it a 


50 


LOTTIE AND VICTOKINE. 


very lively sensation of hunger. And Miss Lottie /proceeded 
to make a hearty, although novel style of breakfast, upon the 
grapes and apricots she had gathered the night before. 

“ 1 hope Victorine hasn't missed me very much," thought 
she. “ And I do wonder what is coming next. I sha'n't 
stay here always, 1 suppose." 

Almost as the thought passed through her mind, there was 
a vehement rattling at the locked grapery door, and through 
the glass she saw the astonished face of the very gardener with 
whom she had parleyed the evening before. 

“ Halloo!" said the gardener. “ How came you here, I'd 
like to know? And your mouth all purple with my prize 
grapes, as I live! Why, you little thievin', sneakin' varmint! 
Why don't you open the door?" 

“ How can I open it," cross-questioned Lottie, with pro- 
voking composure, “ when it's locked on the outside?" 

“ Who locked it?" demanded the man, when he had satis- 
fied himself by ocular inspection that the little prisoner’s as- 
sertion was correct. 

“ Frank did." 

“ Master Frank Fordham did?" 

“ Yes; if that's what you call him. He isn't my master." 

The gardener said nothing, but retiring a few paces to a 
little tool -house built in an angle of the garden wall, produced 
from its inner recesses a second key, by means of which he 
readily unlocked the door, and stalking grimly in, he seized 
Lottie by the shoulder. 

“ Come along," said he. 

“ Where?" demanded Lottie, with dauntless spirit. 

“ Never you mind where! Just you come along, that’s all! 
And I'll see what master says to these 'ere sort of doin's. " 

Silently Lottie was marched along, her brown, tangled curls 
hanging disheveled down her shoulders, her large, brilliant 
eyes glancing furtively this way and that, like the liquid orbs 
of a startled deer, while her little mouth, as Martin Macken- 
zie, the gardener, had truly spoken, was stained with the pur- 
ple juice of the Black Hamburgs she had devoured with such 
a relish, until she found herself ascending the porticoed steps 
of the Manor House, and hurried across the inlaid marble of 
the hall floor toward a large room, where, as she could per- 
ceive at a glance, the family were all assembled— a square 
apartment, high-ceiled, and hung with crimson velvet paper, 
while an oriel window looked toward the lawn, and a number 
of family portraits, in massive gilt frames, seemed to stare 
vindictively down upon her. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


51 


An oval extension-table, hung with glistening double 
damask, and set with china, silver, and cut glass, occupied 
the center of the imposing apartment, and five persons sat 
around it. 

Squire Fordham himself, as he was commonly called in the 
neighborhood, was at the head— a bald-headed, large-framed 
man, with white side- whiskers, a double chin, and a huge dia- 
mond breast-pin. His morning toilet consisted of a gay Per- 
sian dressing-gown, all palm-leaves and pagodas, with a lining 
and tassels of scarlet silk, which, to Lottie AveneFs unaccus- 
tomed eye, gave him the aspect of a woman. Directly oppo- 
site was Mrs. Fordham, tall, hard-featured, and excessively 
plain, although she was richly dressed in a black silk morning 
wrapper, faced with cherry-colored satin, with great mosaic 
ear-drops in her ears, and expensive rings loaded upon her 
bony and ill-shaped fingers. At the right hand of the mis- 
tress of the mansion sat one Mr. Ferdinand Stafford, a distant 
relative of the family of Fordham, who was often invited to 
the Manor House, and much courted on account of his 
wealth. He was a wrinkled, yellow-faced man, appearing 
much older than his actual age, which was only about fifty, 
with a decided stoop in his shoulders, and one limb considera- 
bly shorter than the other, through the ravages of hip disease, 
which peculiarity gave him an awkward limp, and neces- 
sitated the use of a cane as he walked. He had a fretful, mis- 
anthropic face, and played nervously with a small gold-handled 
egg-spoon as he sat at the table. 

On the opposite side, facing the bay-window, were Frank 
Fordham and his only sister, Sara, a tall, flaxen-haired girl of 
about Lottie’s own age, with light-blue eyes, a rather retreat- 
ing chin, and one of those unfortunate complexions which re- 
mind one of a sheet of pie-paste, colorless, dull, and flabby. 
She was dressed in a lovely light-blue muslin wrapper, 
sprinkled over with a pattern of ivy leaves in darker blue, and 
the fluted flounces and ruffles all edged with Valenciennes 
lace — a dress that smote Lottie’s girl-heart with envy and ad- 
miration. 

“ If I could only wear a dress like that!” thought the child, 
true to her feminine instinct, in spite of the awe of this event- 
ful moment. 

And this was the breakfast-table group into which Macken- 
zie, the gardener, advanced, tapping respectfully at the door, 
and giving a pull to his forelock as he crossed the black wal- 
nut threshold. 


* 


52 




’ 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 





CHAPTER X. 

LOTTIE RECEIVES NO MERCY. 

Mr. Fordham dropped his newspaper; Mrs. Fordham, in 
her surprise, forgot to turn the faucet of the great silver 
coffee-urn, and deluged the tray before she knew what she 
was about; Sara turned her slender neck, and stared in 
amazement; and Master Frank, taking a prodigious bite of 
bread and butter, twisted himself around in his chair, winked 
with one eye at Lottie, and chuckled aloud, while Mr. Staf- 
ford laid down the book which he ordinarily read at the break- 
fast-table, and wrinkled his brows into a perfect net-work of 
discontent. 

“ More trouble!” he said, querulously. “ There’s always 
more trouble coming in this world. 1 know that girl has 
been up to some piece of atrocious mischief, Mackenzie. And 
now, what is it?” 

He fitted a gold eyeglass into his eye as he spoke, and 
looked hard at poor, shrinking Lottie with a glance that 
seemed to go through and through her, like magnetic wire. 

“Eh?” said Mr. Fordham. “What is it, Mackenzie? 
Who is this child? And what has she been doing? And why, 
in the name of common sense, do you bounce in upon our 
breakfast-table in this sort of way, when you know perfectly 
well how bad my digestion is, and how essential peace and 
quiet are to me?” 

“ Because, sir,” said Mackenzie, taking his stand in the 
middle of the room, and never once releasing his hold on Lot- 
tie’s shoulder, “I’m that took aback 1 don’t know what else 
to do. Because, sir, I never was so dum-confounded in all 
my life.” 

“ Mackenzie,” said Mr. Stafford, “ don’t be a fool.” 

“ I beg your pardon, sir,” said Mackenzie. “ As how?” 

“ Why the deuce don’t you go on with your story?” de- 
manded Mr. Stafford. “ Keeping us all in suspense. What’s 
it about? What does it all amount to?” 

“Please, sir,” said Mackenzie, apparently bewildered by 
the sharpness and rapidity of the little crooked gentleman’s 
speech, “ it’s her !” 

And he pointed his finger downward toward Lottie, who* 
stood quite quiet. 

“ Little girl,” said Mr. Fordham, “ what’s your name?” 

“ Charlotte Avenel, sir.” 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


53 


44 And what have you been doing ?" 

“Nothing.” 

“ Nothing!" echoed Mackenzie. “A pretty nothing! 
| Look at her mouth, sir, all smeared up with my grapes, as I 
was a-raisin' for the Agricultural Society's prizes. Look at 
her apron all apricot juice. That ain't nothing, sir, is it?" 

And then Frank chimed in. 

“ Papa," said he, 44 it's the girl that knocked my hat over 
the wall, that day we were at Quebec. She's Miss Joanna 
Avenel's niece, down on the West Haven road; and I've often 
found her trespassing on our grounds." 

“ That's a story!" burst in Lottie. 44 1 never was in your 
grounds but once before." 

“ And that time you threw a stone at me, and cut my fore- 
head," retorted Frank. 

Lottie was silent. She knew that circumstantial evidence 
was too much against her for any excuse to be of avail. 

“ My goodness me!" said Mrs. Fordham, sourly. “ What 
a horrid little viper she must be!" 

44 And last night," went on Frank, 44 1 found her in the 
grapery, stuffing herseif, with her apron full of the nicest 
apricots." 

44 That's another story!" breathlessly interposed Lottie, 
confronting him with flashing eyes. 44 1 hadn't eaten a single 
one." 

44 Aha!" croaked Frank. 44 Your mouth tells a different 
story." 

44 Oh, but that was this morning, when I was so awfully 
hungry," explained Lottie. 

44 So," went on Frank, 44 1 just locked her in and left her 
there all night. " 

44 Served her right!" said Mrs. Fordham. 44 A fitting pun- 
ishment for her audacious transgressions!" 

44 Jjittle girl," said Mr. Fordham, turning toward her, with 
: solemn, fish-colored eyes, while the big diamond pin iii his 
gr shirt-front blinked at her like a third eye, 44 what have you to 
say for yourself? Don't you know that people who steal go 
into a lake of burning fire and brimstone?" 

44 That's liars, sir," corrected Lottie. 44 And Frank has 
told more lies than I have this morning!" 

44 Little girl, that is quite irrelevant to the matter under 
discussion," said Mr. Fordham, pompously. 44 1 asked you 
| if you didn't know it was wrong to steal?" 

44 1 suppose so," reluctantly admitted Lottie. 44 But I 
didn't mean to steal; I only wanted a little fruit for my sister, 


54 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


who is sick. And I asked this *nan to give me some, and he 
said he wouldn’t. So what could I do?” 

44 Upon my word,” groaned Mr. Fordham, “the moral 
obliquity of the rising generation is something appalling!” 

“ I wanted it so bad,” said Lottie, with a quivering lip. 

44 And so you helped yourself, eh?” said Mr. Stafford, with 
a sarcastic smile. “ Young one, that is the sort of thing that 
brings people up in front of the gallows and the state prison.” 

44 1 really think, my dear,” said Mrs. Fordham to her hus- 
band, 44 that you should administer some very severe re- 
proof. ” 

44 I’m going to, my dear, I’m going to,” said Mr. Ford- 
ham. 44 Aren’t you ashamed of yourself, you naughty, 
wicked chilld?” 

Lottie had been on the very verge of tears, but these words 
hardened her once more into sullen defiance. 

“ No,” she said, “ I’m not. You ought to be ashamed of 
yourself, with more grapes and apricots than you know what 
to do with, and refusing to spare one to a poor sick child.” 

44 Did any one ever hear such insolence!” cried Mr. Ford- 
ham, elevating his fat palms in dismay* 

44 Bravo! bravo!” said Mr. Stafford, clapping his hands. 
44 A regular agrarian doctrine, this! A political economist 
himself couldn’t have put it better.” 

44 Ferdinand,” said Mrs. Fordham, 44 pray don’t. Oblige 
me by not encouraging this very impertinent child.” 

44 All right, Louisa,” said Mr. Stafford, applying himself 
once more to the contents of his china egg-cup. 

44 My dear,” said Mr. Fordham to his wife, 44 what had we 
better do in this sad business?” 

44 There is but one thing to do,” responded Mrs. Fordham. 
44 Let Mackenzie shut this child into the old nursery. Let 
him go down at once after Miss Joanna Aveuel, her aunt. 
Miss Avenel, as 1 have always heard, is a most respectable 
person, and will, doubtless, be the best judge of what course 
to pursue.” 

And, accordingly, Lottie was once more incarcerated in a 
bare, unfurnished room, at the top of the house, to await the 
awful apparition of her aunt Joanna. 

Miss Avenel promptly obeyed the summons, only pausing 
to tell Yictorine, “ that she needn’t fret any more after that 
ne’er-do-weel sister of hers, who was safe enough up at the 
Manor House.” 

44 A bad penny’s pretty sure to return,” said Miss Joanna, 
as she tied on her bonnet* and looked in the glass to make 


LOTTIE AND VICTOR INE. 


55 


sure, as she expressed it, that “ it had not a separate pinch 
for every day in the week and two for Sundays.” 

“Not that I care a pin for any of the Manor House folks,” 
said Miss Joanna, “ although I've always heard how extrava- 
gantly they dressed, and how the madame had all her bonnets 
made in Paris, but one does like to look decent. I can't guess 
what on earth Charlotte is doing up there . ” 

Miss Avenel's storm of wrath and indignation can be more 
easily imagined than described when, from Mrs. Fordham's 
lips, she learned the plain, unvarnished tale of Lottie's mis- 
doings. But she sat quite silent, gnawing the carved bone 
handle of her black silk parasol, until Mrs. Fordham had 
finished her recital. 

“And I do hope, my dear Miss Avenel,” that lady con- 
cluded at last, “ that you will not allow this occasion to pass 
by without administering proper rebuke, not to say punish- 
ment, to your very refractory and ill-behaved niece.” 

Miss Avenel took out her purse. 

“ If you will allow me to j>ay for the fruit my niece 
plucked — ” began she. 

“ By no means. Miss Avenel,” said Mrs. Fordham, stiffly. 
“ That is a proceeding which Mr. Fordham would altogether 
decline to sanction. The value of the fruit is nothing— com- 
paratively nothing, that is to say. It is the principle of the 
thing. Do 1 make myself understood?” 

“Exactly,” said Miss Avenel. “I am very sorry, Mrs. 
Fordham,” rising as she spoke, “ that Charlotte has thus 
conducted herself. Be assured that 1 shall not allow the fault 
to pass by unreproved. And now, if you will allow your serv- 
ant to call my niece, I will take her home.” 

Side by side Miss Joanna and Lottie walked along the elm- 
shaded road toward home, Lottie glancing ever and anon at 
her aunt, to try and read in her face the sentiments of her 
heart. 

“ Aunt Joanna,” said she, at last, in a timid voice, “ was 
Victorine very much frightened when 1 did not come home 
last night?” 

“ Cried all night,” was the brief reply. 

“ Oh, Aunt Joanna! Did it make her fever worse?” 

“Of course it did,” snapped Miss Avenel. “What else 
could you expect?” 

A nd then followed another long and embarrassing silence- 
embarrassing, at least, to poor Lottie. If Aunt Joanna would 
but scold her — if she would reproach her — if she would do 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


56 

anything but stride grimly on with set lips and adamantine 
brow. 

She ran into Victorine’s room when she reached the Avenel 
cottage, and threw her arms around her sister’s neck. 

“ Were you very much worried, Vicky darling? Did you 
think anything had happened?” 

And then, half gleeful, half ashamed, she told the story of 
her adventure. 

“ But they couldn’t cheat you out of your fruit entirely, 
Vic,” added she, diving down into the depths of her pocket, 
and fishing up a great bunch of White Frontignac grapes, and 
half a dozen apricots a little crushed and bruised, to be sure, 
but fresh and juicy still. “ Eat ’em, darling.” 

And Victorine, even while she enjoyed the delicious flavor 
of the fruit, which was so infinitely grateful to her parched 
tongue and craving palate, looked wistfully up in Lottie’s 
face. 

“ Oh, but, Lottie, 1 am so sorry you got into so much 
trouble just to humor my Whims. And Aunt Joanna is so 
angry!” 

“ I can’t help that,” said Lottie, rather defiantly. 

But, in spite of the assumed valor of her manner, she could 
not help feeling a thrill of apprehension, five minutes or so 
later, when Aunt Joanna entered the room and walked 
straight up to her, with an ominously dark face. 

“ Charlotte Avenel,” said she, “ I have lived to be nearly 
fifty years old, and I never yet heard the name of thief ap- 
plied to a relative of mine. This is the first time — and it will 
be the last. You have offended against all the laws of com- 
mon decency — you have proved yourself unworthy of the name 
you bear — and henceforward my house is no home for you.” 

Lottie colored a deep scarlet — her eyes glittered, and she 
drew herself up with a sort of childish dignity. 

“ Do you mean to turn me out-of-doors. Aunt Joanna?” 

“ 1 mean to harbor no thieves or gypsies, Charlotte Ave- 
nel.” 

“ Then I will go,” said Lottie, quietly turning away. 

Victorine burst into a shower of tears. 

“ Lottie, Lottie, don’t go!” sobbed she. “ Don’t leave 
me. Aunt Joanna, tell her to stay. Oh, what shall I do 
without her?” 

But Lottie, even while she took Victorine’s fevered, trem- 
bling hand tenderly into her grasp, made no direct answer to 
her wild appeals. 


LOTTIE AND VICTOKINE. 5? 

“ Aunt Joanna,” she said, tremulously, “ will you be kind 
to Victorine?” 

“ Til try and do my duty by her,” said Miss. Avenel, cold- 
ly. “ Unless, indeed, she should take to laying hands on other 
people’s property. ” 

“ Then I will no longer burden you with my maintenance,” 
said Lottie, wincing a little at the envenomed barb of her 
aunt’s word. “ Never mind, Vic,” as she kissed her sister’s 
cheek, “ it’s best we should part for a little while.” 

“But, Lottie, where are you going? What do you mean 
to do?” 

“ I don’t quite know yet,” said Lottie. “ But I know 1 
shall succeed. I feel quite sure of it, Vicky dear. And I’ll 
write to you very soon, and tell you all my adventures — and 
when I’m rich you shall come and live with me.” 

Oh, blessed kaleidoscope of Youth and Hope which turns 
all the future into a glory of vague brightness! Lottie Ave- 
nel was only a child, unfriended and alone, yet she never for 
a moment doubted that by her own maiden efforts she could 
conquer the world, which lay, like an unknown army, around 
the outer gates of her life. 

“Don’t cry, Vic,” she reiterated, stroking her sister’s 
cheek with loving hands whose magnetic touch seemed to 
smooth away the pain. “ Indeed, indeed, darling, it’s bet- 
ter so. I never could have got along with Aunt Joanna. She 
hates me, and I hate her; but you are so meek and gentle, 
dear, she can’t he)p being good to you. *And when you’re 
quite well and strong again. I’ll write and tell you just where 
I am,” lowering her voice so that it could not reach the ears 
of the stern female autocrat who was just then hanging her 
dish- towel over the kitchen rack, “ and send you some money, 
and you shall come to me, and bring Pearlie with you. And, 
oh, we’ll be so happy!” 

And Victorine, bewildered and "heart-broken though she 
was at the prospect of a separation from the sister, who had 
been all in all to her during their two brief lives, could not 
but catch the infection of Lottie’s cheery hopefulness, and 
smiled even through her tears. 

“But, Lottie, it seems so far off,” she wailed. 

“ The time will soon pass, dear,” encouraged Lottie. 

Aud side by side, whispering softly to each other, Lottie 
and Victorine Avenel passed the last night which they were 
destined to spend together for more years than had as yet en- 
tered into the scope of their childish calculations. 


58 


LOTTIE AND VICTORIA. 


CHAPTER XL 

LOOKING FOR WORK. 

Early in the morning of the summer day, when the robins 
were warbling their first orisons, and the east was all one 
burnished glow with the .coming footsteps of the sun, Lottie 
Avenel arose and dressed herself as quietly as possible, for 
Victorine's room was just below, and her slumbers were at all 
times light and easily disturbed, and Miss Joanna's apartment 
was situated directly across the entry. And Lottie had often 
heard her aunt boast that a mouse gliding across the floor, or 
a dead leaf drifting against the window, was sufficient to 
awaken her. 

She packed her few little belongings into a compact bundle, 
which he tied up in a red-bordered towel, which had once be- 
longed to her friend Mrs, Hyde, in Quebec, put on her hat, 
and stole noiselessly down-stairs, and out of the kitchen door, 
closing it softly behind her. 

“ What will Aunt Joanna think?" she asked herself, with 
a thrill of exultant terror, “ when she cojnes down and finds 
the kitchen door unbolted? She will surely believe that burg- 
lars have been in the house; but 1 can't help it." 

She paused a second under Yictorine's window, with an in- 
describable yearning to look once more upon her sister's sweet 
sleeping face — to press her lips once more to the pallid, fever- 
blanched cheek, but she knew that could not be. Stooping to 
gather a moss rosebud from the bush that grew close to the 
doorstep, she kissed its fragrant petals and laid it on the 
window-sill. 

“ Perhaps Vic will see it and know that I put it there," she 
murmured to herself, and^ then set off, walking as rapidly as 
she could through the dewy grass, winking hard as she went 
to keep back the tears. 

Whither was she to go? In what direction was she to turn? 
Lottie Avenel had by no means settled this question in her 
mind, but she had a vague idea of making her way to some 
of the great manufacturing towns in the vicinage of New 
Haven, where, as she had heard in stray items of conversation 
between Miss Joanna Avenel and her visitors, that girls scarce- 
ly older than herself were often taken in and paid according to 
the work they did. Or, perhaps, some of the farmers' wives 
that lived in the pretty, maple-shaded houses she had seen in 
the course of her southward journey from Quebec, would 


LOTTIE AND YICTOMNE. 


59 


want a handy girl to help about the kitchen. Lottie felt that 
her apprenticeship to Miss Joanna would stand her in good 
stead here, and she was willing to begin at the very bottom 
round of the ladder, so that she could but have a reasonable 
prospect of promotion in due time. 

All that morning she toiled patiently on, for it was no part 
of her plan to settle down sufficiently near home for Miss 
Joanna to be enabled to pounce on her and recapture her, as 
Lottie felt that she might possibly do if she should change her 
mind on the subject of her little culprit of a niece. 

“ 1 won’t go back, anyway,” said Lottie to herself. “ She 
has turned me out-of-doors, and she shall abide by her de- 
cision.” 

At one rude railway station where she stopped to rest and 
ask for a drink of water, a long, ungainly freight train was 
just wriggling its serpentine length into motion. 

“ Where is that train going?” she asked of the station-mas- 
ter who had given her the drink in a cup formed out of a 
broken cocoanut-shell. 

“ Derby and Hoppertown,” said the man, briefly. “ Noon 
freight.” 

“ Could I ride on it?” asked Lottie, wistfully. 

“ Ain’t no passenger cars,” answered the man. “ Didn’t 
I tell you it was freight?” 

“Yes, I know,” said Lottie, speaking hurriedly, for the 
cars began to accelerate their pace as they glided past; “ but 
I’m a poor girl and have no money but ten cents, and 1 want 
to go to Derby. I couldn’t pay the fare on a passenger 
train.” 

“ Oh,” said the agent. “ Why didn’t you say so before? 
Yes, I calculate you can ride, if you don’t mind rough quar- 
ters. Here, Bill,” to a brakeman, “ this little gal wants to 
go to Derby. Give her a lift.” 

And seizing her under the arms as if she had been a three- 
year-old child, the good-natured Yankee swung her on the top 
of a pile of grain bags. The brakeman grinned. 

“ Through freight, eh?” said he. “ And not down on the 
bill.” 

Lottie did not understand what he meant, but she took out 
a ten-cent piece, her sole capital. 

“ If you please, sir,” said she, “ this is all I have got.” 

“ Oh, get out!” said the brakeman. “Who wants your 
money?” 

“ I thought you did, sir,” said Lottie, timorously. 


60 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“ You thought wrong, then/' said the man. “ Going to 
Derby?” 

“Yes, sir.” 

“ Friends meet you at the depot?” 

“ No, sir,” said Lottie, soberly. “ I don't expect any one 
to meet me. ” 

“Humph!” said the man. “Perhaps you're one of the 
factory gals?” 

“So,” said Lottie. “ But I’m going to be.” 

“ Got a place engaged?” 

“No— but— ” 

“ I wouldn't be too sartin about it, then, if I was you,” 
said the man, folding his arms as he leaned back against the 
edge of the car. “ Times is hard. Lots of factories is shut- 
tin’ down work altogether all over the country, and lots more 
is running on half time. " 

Lottie's heart sunk within her. 

“ But I can try, 1 suppose,” said she. 

“ Oh, yes, you can try,” said the man. “ There ain't no 
law agin that.” 

He was good-natured, and disposed to be talkative, so that 
the time was not so tedious in passing as one would suppose 
before they reached Derby. 

Lottie jumped off, and thanking her companion for the ride 
she had had, walked off up the first street she came to. 

It was not difficult, by dint of inquiry, to find her way to 
the great factories which form the bone and sinew of the 
thriving little town of Derby— but, to her dismay, her ex- 
perience entirely corroborated the report of her friend the 
brakeman. Ali the factories were full — some were already 
discharging their hands, in anticipation of an unprecedently 
dull season — and nowhere was there a chance for our poor 
little Lottie to earn her living. 

Foot-sore, dejected, and weary, she paused at last on the 
dusty sidewalk, and looked hesitatingly around her. 

“ Perhaps somebody will want a girl,” thought Lottie. 
“If 1 could only get a place for a little while, I could have 
time to make up my mind what to do next.” 

But the very first place at which she applied put a damper 
upon her zeal. 

“ Eh?” said a woman who came to the door, with her skirts 
pinned up behind, and a red cotton pocket-handkerchief 
twisted turban-wise over her head. “ A girl? What kind of 
a girl?” 

“ A servant-girl, ma’am,” said Lottie, timorously. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


61 


“ Who sent you?” 

“ Nobody, ma’am.” 

“ Where have you lived?” 

And Lottie was forced to confess that she had not lived any- 
where in the exact capacity alluded to. 

“Humph!” snorted the woman. “Got any recom- 
mends?” 

“ No, ma’am.” 

“ Then,” said the woman, “ you must be a born fool to ex- 
pect I or anybody else am going to employ you. Get out! I 
don’t believe a word of your story.” 

And she shut the door in Lottie’s bewildered and indignant 
face. 

Lottie walked to the end of the street, sat down on an 
empty packing-case in front of a . shoe store, and cried a little. 
She could not help it. 

“Halloo!” said the proprietor of the shoe store, emerging 
therefrom; “ what’s the matter, little girl?” 

• “Nothing much, sir,” said Lottie, hurriedly drying her 
eyes; “ only I’m trying to get a situation.” 

“ What sort of a situation?” asked the man, who found 
the time drag heavily, and did not object to a little sidewalk 
gossip. 

“ Any kind of work, sir. Do you know of any one who 
wants a girl?” 

“ Not I,” said the man, filling his pipe from a bag of to- 
bacco which he carried in his pocket. “Folks round here- 
abouts is their own gals pretty much.” 

He lighted his pipe and smoked a puff or two, while Lot- 
tie sat gazing at him in blank helplessness. 

“ Been to Peck & Paislees?” said he, at last. 

“ Where’s that, sir?” asked Lottie, a gleam of hope be- 
ginning to kindle in her breast. 

“Just down Catacomb Street. Big suit makers. Ladies’ 
and children’s linen, cambric, and calico suits. They ad- 
vertised yesteiday for a lot of young gals to learn the trade.” 

Lottie jumped to her feet. 

“ Oh, thank you for telling me, sir!” said she. “Is it 
far? And how much do you think 1 can earn there?” 

“ Oh, you’d have to work a year afore they’d pay you any 
wages,” said the man. “ These green hands costs more than 
they come to, in teach in’ and bother, and waste of material 
and sewin’-machine ile.” 

Lottie’s countenance fell once more. 


62 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“ Oh/' said she, “ then there’s no use in my going. I 
must get some place where I can earn a little.” 

“ Folks can’t always get what they wants,” said the man, 
and he went back into his shoe store, evidently under the im- 
pression that Lottie was idle and shiftless, and didn’t really 
stand in need of a place. 

It was sunset now, and Lottie felt very faint and weary, as 
she trudged slowly along through the suburbs of the city of 
Derby, making a trial here and there for work wherever she 
saw a place that seemed in any way likely to afford any pros- 
pect of success. But the result was almost invariably the 
same — a negative given with more or less lack of courtesy. 

It was dusk when once more she found herself among the 
green lanes and breezy commons of the open country, and 
hero she stopped at a little, one-story farm-house, where the 
family were just sitting down to tea, by the light of a kerosene 
lamp. Lottie was hungry and weak for want of food, and the 
fried ham and eggs on the platter in the center of the table 
sent forth a most appetizing odor, to say nothing of the fra- 
grance of the tea and hot buttermilk biscuits. 

“ Oh, mamma,” cried a plump four-year-old child in a 
higli-chair, opposite the door, who was battering away at his 
tin mug of milk with a Brittania spoon, “ dere’s a ’ittle dirl 
wooking in at de door!” 

The mother turned around to look. 

“ What’s wanting?” cried she, sharply. 

“Won’t you please give me something to eat?” asked 
famished Lottie, with her eyes glued to the great dish of 
fried slices of ham, each one crowned with a golden egg. 

“ No,” said the farmer himself, interrupting his wife’s re- 
ply. “ Go about your business.” 

“ But I’m so hungry,” pleaded Lottie. 

“ Nonsense!” said the man; “ that is all put on. Nobody 
need be hungry nowadays that’s willing to work. The coun- 
try’s full of these idle tramps.” 

Lottie was turning sorrowfully away when the mother of 
the family spoke up in her behalf. 

“ That’s pretty hard talk, father,” said she. “ Perhaps 
the child is hungry. Anyway, a bowl of tea and a bit of 
bread and butter don’t cost much! Just you wait a spell, 
sissy.” 

Lottie sat down on the doorstep, eagerly expectant, and 
presently the woman brought her some tea in a blue-edged 
bowl, and a bountiful slice of bread and butter— the bread 
white as drifted snow-flakes, the butter tasting of clover bios- 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


63 


soms and daisies — and a plate of ham and eggs. The child 
eat like one famished. Never in all her life had food tasted 
so delicious to her. 

“ You're very hungry, aren't you, child?" said the wom- 
an, as she brought her a wedge of thick apple-pie, flavored 
with fennel seeds, to finish. 

„ “ Oh, yes,. ma'am, I'm most starved," said Lottie, lifting 
her eyes to the face of her kindly interlocutor. “ I'm trying 
to get work. You don't know of any one who wants a handy 
girl, do you?" 

The woman shook her head. She did not — and, thanking 
her for her hospitality, poor Lottie set forth again upon her 
weary way. 

Earning her own living was harder work than she had 
fancied — and yet Lottie was not discouraged. The elastic 
spirits of youth, the firm faith in her own abilities, which are 
among God's most Messed gifts to His solitary little ones of 
this world, had not deserted her. To be sure she had been 
unsuccessful to-day, but what was to prevent her trying again 
on the morrow? 

She slept that night in an old ruined stone mill, where the 
stars peeped down upon her through the rifts in the roof, and 
a noisy stream soothed her to rest with its lullaby, and 
dreamed of Victorine. 


CHAPTER XII. 

GETTING DISCOURAGED. 

“ I know I shall succeed to-day," thought Lottie, the next 
morning, as she bathed her face in the clear running waters 
that had once served to turn the mill-wheel whose slats were 
now choked with weeds and overgrown with green moss. 
“ Because I dreamed last night that I came home to Victor- 
ine with my apron heaped full of dollar bills. And dreams 
do mean something. Martin Genoux, at Quebec, always be- 
lieved in dreams — and so did old. Marie Floret, who swept out 
the French cathedral. Yes, I'm quite certain I'm going to 
succeed to-day." 

She wet her curls in the ripples and shook them into as de- 
cent a shape as she could, and then set cheerily forth to meet 
the coming fortune of which she was so sure. 

Her breakfast consisted of blackberries, ripe and shining, 
from the road-side, and a drink of milk, given her by a man 
who was milking in a lane just out of the main turnpike. 


64 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


But, further than this, the omen of her dreams proved utter- 
ly fallacious. Repulsed from door to door, she soon became 
discouraged. Some were coldly civil, others rude and 
brusque, even going so far as to accuse her of being the 
“ decoy ” to a gang of burglars who were just then infesting 
the country, and threatening to have her up before a magis- 
trate. At one place they set the dogs on her, and Lottie only 
escaped with a tattered dress, and beating heart, after a 
breathless scamper of nearly a quarter of a mile. The farmer 
laughed aloud, and appeared to regard it as an excellent joke, 
as lie finally called off his dogs; but to poor little terrified 
Lottie it was little less than the tortures of the Inquisition. 
And as the.day dragged its slow, sultry length along, the fort- 
une seemed further off and more impracticable than ever. 

“ But I never, never will go back to Aunt Joanna, after 
what she said,” declared Lottie to herself. 

It was nearly sunset when she applied humbly at the 
kitchen door of a handsome, substantial-looking country- 
house, after having been very careful first to ascertain that 
the dogs on the broad veranda were of iron, not flesh and 
blood. 

*' ‘ Something to eat?” snarled the cook, a huge, bloated- 
faced woman. “ I declare I thought it was the butcher or the 
baker, or 1 wouldn't a-troubled to come- to the door. No. 
We never give to beggars.” 

“ Perhaps,” began "Lottie, who lost no practicable oppor- 
tunity to push her inquiries, “you know of some one who 
wants a little — 99 

But the unceremonious banging of the door in her face was 
all the answer vouchsafed by the cook, whose temper, to 
judge by appearances, was as hot as the kitchen fire. 

Lottie sat down on the area steps to rest a little, but even 
this poor consolation was denied her. 

“ Be about your business, you!” said a respectable-looking 
man, who just then came down the broad path, rolling a 
grass-cutter before him. “We don't want no vagrants loafin' 
about here. Master's a justice of the peace, and he'll clap 
you into jail quicker than wink if you don't look sharp.” 

Lottie rose to her feet at this terrible threat, and stumbled, 
rather than walked back to the road, for hungefand fatigue 
were beginning to stamp their outward marks upon her, and 
there was a curious buzzing in her head and ringing in her 
ears which she could not at all comprehend. 

Slowly she walked along, dragging one weary little foot 
after the other, until she came to the high garden wall at the 


65 




LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 

south end of the estate, where the road wound away in an- 
other direction. A small inner gate gave a peep into a vegeta- 
ble garden within, where long rows of silver-green onions, 
thickets of ripening tomatoes, and miniature forests of sweet 
corn and Lima bean poles, presented an aspect as neat as a 
lady’s boudoir. And against the south wall trellises of ripened 
grapes sent forth a heavy, delicious fragrance at every breeze. 

Grapes again! If the apple was a stumbling-block to our 
mother Eve, grapes seemed fated to be the especial tempta- 
tion of Lottie Avenel. Driven by the keen tooth of hunger, 
she pushed the gate softly to see if it was locked. 

To her surprise and delight it creaked softly on its hinges 
and swung inward. It was latched, but not locked. 

“ I -II only take a few,” thought Lottie, as she crept into 
this domain, looking stealthily this way and that, w r ith a live- 
ly fear of detection from some of the myrmidons of the all- 
powerful “justice of the peace,” whose very name had 
stricken such awe into her heart. 4 4 1 hope it isn’t very 
wrong, but 1 am so awfully hungry, and it seems just as if 
there was something gnawing inside my stomach. I’ll only 
just take one or two little,. teeny bits of bunches.” 

But those that hung within her reach, although already 
purpled, were sour and unpalatable. Higher up, the deep 
rich color of ripeness attracted her eager, famished gaze. A 
ladder, balanced against the wall, with a basket standing be- 
side it, showed where some one had already begun to gather 
the fruit; and without an instant’s hesitation Lottie stumbled 
up its rounds, perched herself on the very summit of the 
wall, and there began to sate her craving appetite. 

How delicious the rich, juicy fruit tasted to her — food and 
drink at once. How eagerly she leaned over, searching un- 
der the broad, beautifully shaped leaves for the ripest, purplest 
grapes, not even perceiving, in her intense preoccupation, 
the light sound of advancing footsteps on the garden path, un- 
til suddenly the ladder was jerked away from its place, fall- 
ing on the turf below with a crash, which had very nearly 
caused Lottie to follow its example. Fortunately, however, 
she was securely seated on the broad top of the garden wall, 
her feet dangling down, and her arm safely thrown around 
the trunk of a tall young maple-tree, which grew on the out- 
side. 

“ That’s right,” cried out a shrill, high-pitched voice. 
“ Help yourself. Make yourself entirely at home, and then 
get down afterward if you can. Why,” with a long pause of 
recognizing astonishment, “ it’s the little thief of West Haven. 


66 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


The very child who was shut up all night in Fordham’s green- 
houses! So you are at your old tricks again, eh?” 

And to her amazement and terror — for really it seemed as 
if there must be some witchcraft in the business — Lottie 
found herself gazing down from her elevated perch into the 
sharp features and ugly, shriveled face of Mr. Ferdinand 
Stafford. 

Lottie looked around with an apprehensive start. For a 
moment or two she fully expected to see Aunt Joanna and 
the whole Fordham family at his heels; but she immediately 
perceived, to her great relief, that he was alone. And for a 
second or so they looked hard at each other, the child perched 
on the top of the garden wall, the deformed little old man 
leaning on his crutch below, with his sharp, inquiring face 
turned up toward her, a whole colony of interrogation points 
in every feature. Then Lottie spoke in quick, panting tones: 

“ Please, sir, don’t tell the master of the house; he’d put 
me in jail. ” 

“ And you deserve it, don’t you?” said the gentleman, with 
asperity. 

“ I’ve only taken a few, sir — and 1 was starving. 1 asked 
the cook for something to eat, and she said they never gave to 
beggars.” 

“ How came you here?” demanded the old gentleman. 

“ I’ve run away,” said Lottie. “ Please don’t tell Aunt 
Joanna where I am. She told me she wouldn’t have me in 
the house, but perhaps she might make me come back, if — ” 

“What’s that on your foot?” sharply interrupted Mr. 
Stafford, pointing with his finger to a spot on Lottie’s foot, 
where, plainly visible through a ragged hole in her cheap boot, 
the crimson blood had stained her tattered stocking. 

“ I think it’s blood, sir,” said Lottie. 

“ How came it there?” 

“ I’ve walked so far, sir, and the soles of my feet are all 
sore,” explained Lottie. 

“ What’s your name? I heard down at the Manor,” said 
the old gentleman, “ but I’ve forgotten.” 

“ Lottie Avenel, sir. But,” with a scared glance all around 
her, “ do let me come down. I’ll run away as fast as ever I 
can; only don’t tell the master of the house, because : — ” 

“ I’m the master of the house,” said Mr. Stafford. 

Lottie scrambled to her feet, pale and trembling. 

“ You won’t put me in prison, will you, sir?” she de- 
manded, in piteous, pleading accents. 

“1 don’t know why I shouldn’t,” said Mr. Stafford, 




LOTTIE AND VICTOItINE. 07 

gravely, and enjoying the terrors of the detected trespasser as 
a malicious-minded cat delights in the vain efforts of a mouse 
to elude her grasp. “ This is the second offense, is it not?” 

“ Oh, but please, sir, I didn’t mean any harm. And I was 
so hungry. Please, please , don’t put me in prison!” 

Mr. Stafford looked at the poor little blood-stained foot, and 
his heart melted. 

“ Well,” said he, “ I won’t. But come down, and we’ll 
talk it over.” 

“ I can’t, sir,” said Lottie, gazing at the ladder. 

“I’ll call Tim to put that thing up again,” said Mr. Staf- 
ford. “ Don’t cry. I’m not going to cut your head off, nor 
ypt shut you up in jail.” 

The gardener, summoned by the peal of a silver whistle, 
which Mr. Stafford carried in his pocket, presently came, and 
stared with all his eyes when he saw the ragged child on the 

wall. 

“ Well, 1 never!” said he. “ If it ain’t the very self-same 
little vagrant as I warned off the premises not fifteen minutes 
ago!” 

“ Hold your tongue. Mason,” said his master. ' “ And 
speak when you are spoken to.” 

“ Yes, sir,” said Mason. 

“ Put up that ladder. Put it up strong, now.” 

“ It ’ud bear half a ton, sir, now,” said Mason, testing it 
with his own by no means light weight. 

“ Very well,” said Mr. Stafford. “ Now, then, Lottie, if 
that’s your name, come down.” 

And Lottie obeyed, wondering half apprehensively what was 
to come next. 

Mr. Stafford leaned on his crutch and looked intently down 
at Lottie. Lottie shaded her eyes with one scratched, sun- 
burned little hand, and looked intently up at him. 

Her curls were tangled, her face tinted with the warm touch 
of the August sun, her mouth stained with fruit and berries, 
while her madder-colored calico dress was torn and spotted, 
and the brim of her cheap straw hat notched and fringed by 
the brier thickets and woodland undergrowth through which 
she had struggled. 

“ How old are you, Lottie?” said Mr. Stafford, after a brief 
silence. 

“ Thirteen, sir.” 

“ Humph! Old enough to know better.” 

> Lottie was silent. She was aware that circumstances were 
somewhat against her, and wisely attempted no defense. 


V V • •• s - - • v :v;< 


(38 LOTTIE ANI) YICTOKINE. 

“ And what do you suppose is going to be the end of this, 
Lottie?” resumed Mr. Stafford, still penetrating her with 
those keen, light-blue eyes of his, which seemed to flash like 
daggers of steel. 

“ Of what, sir?” 

“ Of all these adventures of yours.” 

“ I don’t quite know, sir— that is, not just yet. But I 
mean to make my fortune.” 

“ And a pretty way you’ve taken to do it,” said Mr. Staf- 
ford, grimly. “ Now, let me understand all about it. Why 
did you run away? What are you here for? What’s the 
meaning of the whole thing?” 

And Lottie Avenel, beginning at the beginning, told him 
the whole story of her life. Mr. Stafford was a misanthrope 
both by nature and cultivation— one who had trained him- 
self systematically to look on the worst side of human nature, 
and to believe in the least elevated motives. But, neverthe- 
less, he could not but be melted by the simple and pathetic 
tale of Lottie’s orphanage and desolation, and the hard fate 
that had driven her out into the world at the time when most 
young girls are shielded by the sacred aegis of parental love 
and the hearth-stone of home. Mr. Stafford was no con- 
temptible judge of character — and he knew by Lottie’s man- 
ner that she was telling him neither more nor less than the 
truth. 

“ My dear,"” said Mr. Stafford, when she had finished her 
simple tale, “ I’m sorry for you. Come into the house with 
me.” 

And he turned and hobbled briskly off toward the house, 
whose red-brick fa9ade was visible through the trees beyond. 
Lottie followed, mutely accepting her fate as it was dealt out 
to her, while Mason, the gardener, stared after them in 
surprise. 

44 Well, if I ever!” said Mason, half aloud, as he gathered 
up spade, rake, and hoe. 44 That there little tramp has come 
it over the old gent with her glib tongue and her smooth 
ways. I s’posed, sure and sartin, he’d be packing her off to 
the lock-up, and there she is a-struttin’ into the front door 
like she was invited company. Honesty ain't the best policy 
nowadays, it seems. And I’m sure I don’t know what this 
world is cornin’ to.” 


LOTTIE AND VICTORIHE. 


69 


CHAPTER XIII. 

MRS. STAFFORD. 

“Where’s my wife?” demanded Mr. Stafford, staring 
around the empty drawing-room. 

Mrs. Stafford was in a pretty little room*, hung and ffir- 
nished with bright blue, with checked India matting on the 
floor, and water-colored engravings hanging around the walls, 
busily engaged in crystallizing grasses. She was in all re- 
spects as different from the husband as possible. In the first 
place, Mr. Stafford was noticeably plain, and Mrs. Stafford 
had the azure eyes, the rippling yellow hair, and the pink- 
aud-white complexion of a doll. Mr. Stafford’s temper was 
as short as pie-crust, and as uncertain as an April day; Mrs. 
Stafford was all smiles and sweetness. Mr. Stafford was in- 
telligent and penetrating beyond the average, and Mrs. 
Stafford — at least so the neighboring gentry were wont to de- 
clare — was little short of a fool! With all this, Mrs. Stafford 
was twenty years her husband’s junior, and very much afraid 
of him. Iiow she ever came to marry him was a standing 
enigma. Some declared it was because he had ordered her to 
do so, and she had hot dared to disobey; some hinted that she 
had been of low extraction, a scullery maid, even, at some 
hotel where he had been detained by one of his frequent at- 
tacks of nervous illness, and that he had caught sight of her 
pretty face, and married her to please the whim of the mo- 
ment. One thing was certain — that Mrs. Stafford never 
alluded to her past life, and that she never dared express any 
opinion of her own without keeping her eyes wistfully fixed 
on her husband’s face, as a spaniel studies his master’s look. 

She was sitting at a. table very busy and very happy, with a 
great Maltese cat, blue-ribboned and decorated with gilt bells, 
asleep on a blue silk cushion, on one side, and a pet poodle 
on the other, while she herself was richly dressed in a violet 
silk dress, and liberally adorned with jewels— fair, plump, 
and dimpled, with great blue eyes, round features, and hair 
hanging in yellow tendrils over her low, expressionless fore- 
head. 

“ What are you doing, Oriana?” sharply questioned Mr. 
Stafford. 

Mrs. Stafford rose up guiltily, and then sat down again in 
a flurry. 

“ I’m crystallizing grasses, love,” said she. “ Mrs. Mig- 


70 


LOTTIE AND VICTOEINE. 


not showed me how. It’s very easy, and Pm very particular 
not to stain the table-cover.” 

“ Fooling away your time, eh?” said Mr. Stafford. “Just 
as you’re always doing.” 

“I’m very sorry, love,” said Mrs. Stafford, uneasily lock- 
ing and interlocking her fingers. “ Indeed, I’ve looked all 
over the stockings, and sewed on the shirt buttons tight, 
and — ” 

“Here’s a little girl I’ve brought you, Oriana,” inter- 
rupted Mr. Stafford, with a motion of his hand toward Lot- 
tie, who had followed him into the bright little boudoir. 

Mrs. Stafford was not at all surprised. She would not have 
been surprised, in fact, if Mr. Stafford had led in a huge 
rhinoceros or a Bengal tiger, and requested her to enroll it 
among the number of her pets. She was never surprised at 
anything that her husband did. “ He’s such a genius,” Mrs. 
Stafford would say to her maid, Eliza, who was the one per- 
son of all others most nearly admitted into her confidence. 
“ And I know very well that I’m not!” So Mrs. Stafford 
smiled softly at Lottie, and said: 

“ How do you do, dear?” 

“ I’m pretty well, ma’am,” said Lottie, thinking how love- 
ly the blue-eyed lady was. 

“ Shall 1 kiss her, dear?” Mrs. Stafford asked of her hus- 
band. 

“ No!” snarled Mr. Stafford. “ Oriana, you’re a fool!” 

This was a fact of which Mr. Stafford told his wife about 
nine times a day, on an average, so that, although Lottie 
colored with sympathetic embarrassment, Mrs. Stafford only 
smiled, and sat down among her grasses again, as if quite con- 
tented. 

“Perhaps she would like something to eat?” said Mrs. 
Stafford. 

“Take her upstairs to your room,” said Mr. Stafford. 
“ Let your women wash her up and put on a whole frock, 
and let her come down to tea.” 

Mrs. Stafford looked puzzled. 

“ Did you mean her to stay here always, love?” said she. 

“ Did you hear what I said?” retorted her husband. 

“ Yes, dear.” 

“ Then why don’t you attend to it?” 

“ Certainly, love,” said Mrs. Stafford. “ Come with me, 
my dear.” 

And Lottie was led upstairs to Mrs. Stafford’s own elegant 
suite of apartments, where Eliza was presently summoned. A 


— 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE 71 

perfumed bath, fresh clothing, and a careful toilet soon made 
her presentable. For she was nearly as tall as her hostess, 
although more slender, and was easily fitted. 

“ My dear,” said Mrs. Stafford, “ what is your name?” 

“ Lottie Avenel, ma’am.” 

“ And where did Mr. Stafford find you?” 

“Out in the garden, ma’am,” said Lottie, blushing vio- 
lently, and hoping no one would tell her dimpled, rose-cheeked 
patroness the story of the grapes. 

“ Dear me, how funny!” said Mrs. Stafford. “ He’s 
always finding something out there. He found a fossil last 
week, and a three- winged butterfly. 1 wonder what he’ll find 
next? Don’t you think he’s very odd, my dear?” 

“ I think he’s very kind,” said Lottie. 

“Oh, of course,” said Mrs. Stafford. “Only he’s so 
dreadfully intelligent. Do you know what the Darwinian 
theory is, my dear?” 

“ No, ma’am,” confessed Lottie. 

“No more does Eliza,” said Mrs. Stafford, triumphantly. 
“ Because he’s always talking about it. I looked in the 
directory — no, I mean in the dictionary — but there wasn’t a 
word about it. Perhaps you don’t know what ‘ pre-Raphael- 
ite ’ ” (speaking the words very slowly and doubtfully, as if 
she were not quite certain about them) “ means?” 

Again Lottie was forced to confess her ignorance. 

“ There it is,” said Mrs. Stafford, drumming her pretty 
pink- tipped fingers on the inlaid table in front of her. “ A 
woman’s head-piece is certainly smaller than a man’s — and I 
think somehow the long hair takes the strength out of it — 
like Samson and Delilah, you know, my dear, only Samson 
wasn’t a woman; but it’s all the same, you know, and posi- 
tively those six-syllabled words — Yes, love, I’m coming!” 

And she started up, nervously smoothing the flounces of 
her dress, as Mr. Stafford’s voice was heard inquiring up the 
staircase, “if no one was going to give him any tea that 
night.” 

Lottie Avenel looked very shy and pretty as she came into 
the room, in one of Mrs. Stafford’s blue silk wrappers, tucked 
up to a proper length by Eliza’s ready needle. 

“ Well, little girl,” said Mr. Stafford, “you look rather 
less like a burglar’s eldest daughter now.” 

“ Please, sir,” said Lottie, sidling up to him, and lowering 
her voice to suit his especial ear, “ don’t tell her /” 

“ Don’t tell her what?” 

“ That— that I stole the grapes.” 


72 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


“No, I won’t so long as you behave yourself,” said Mr. 
Stafford, with a chuckle. 

Directly after tea Mr. Stafford retired into his library, 
where no one was ever allowed to follow him except by special 
permission. Mrs. Stafford sat twirling her thumb, and look- 
ing uncomfortably at Lottie. 

“ Would you like a doll, my dear?” she asked, at length. 

“ A doll?” Lottie could not help bursting into a laugh. 
“ I’m much too big for dolls, ma’am.” 

“ Perhaps you can play cribbage?” said Mrs. Stafford 

“ I never learned,” said Lottie. 

“ Well, then. I’ll tell you what,” said Mrs. Stafford, her 
puzzled countenance beginning to brighten, “ we’ll go up- 
stairs, and I’ll show you all my dresses and jewels and 
things. Wouldn’t you like that V 9 

“ Very much, ma’am,” said Lottie, her native politeness 
inducing her to answer as she saw she was expected to. 

Mrs. Stafford was delighted. Her big blue eyes glittered, 
her cheeks grew pink as the heart of a damask rose, her 
tongue ran almost ceaselessly, as Eliza brought out dress 
after dress from the inside of a series of wardrobes, and she 
displayed their beauties, expatiated on their- cost, and called 
Lottie’s attention to their different styles of trimming. 

“ Thirty-one of them!” said she, triumphantly. “ One 
for each day of the month, all of them silk, and all made by 
Madame Peronneau. And the months that have only thirty 
days, 1 have to change twice on Sunday. I assure you, my 
dear, it’s quite trying to the brain to keep the regular order 
up. They’re all numbered. This is Thirteen,” glancing 
down on the violet flounces. “ And how do you like Num- 
ber Thirteen?” 

“ It is very beautiful,” said Lottie, with sincerity. 

“Number Fourteen, which I shall put on to-morrow, is 
rose color, striped with white,” added Mrs. Stafford, “ and 1 
wear it with a black lace scarf. Number Fifteen — why, I de- 
clare the child is asleep!” 

“ No, I’m not, ma’am,” said Lottie, starting from a mo- 
mentary lapse into drowsiness, and opening her eyes very wide 
to prove that she was undeniably wide awake. 

“ Number Fifteen is pale-blue moire antique,” went on 
Mrs. Stafford, rocking herself back and forth in the intensity 
of her enjoyment. “ Number Sixteen — ” 

“ Ma’am,” interposed Eliza, “ you’ll give yourself the 
headache if you try to remember ’em all without the little 
pearLbacked memorandy book with the gilt edges.” 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


73 


“ So 1 shall,” assented Mrs. Stafford, who was as docile as 
a kitten. “ Eliza, you’re a very good, thoughtful girl. And 
now, my dear,” to Lottie, “ you shall see the jewels. Eliza, 
bring the jewels.” 

And Lottie, half asleep, had the merits of half a dozen 
different sets of jewels dinned into her ears by their pro- 
prietress 3 who sat among them pleased and complacent. 

“I’ll show you the diamonds some day,” said Mrs. Staf- 
ford. “ Mr. Stafford won’t let me keep them. They’re 
locked up in his safe. He says I haven’t judgment when to 
wear them. Oh, you’d fall in love with my diamonds.” 

Just at this moment a prodigious thumping against the 
floor under their feet made Lottie jump up under the vague 
impression that there was an earthquake somewhere, and a 
voice roared out through a speaking-tube, whose silver mouth 
peeped through the rose-colored curtains of the apartment: 

“ Time to go to bed, and leave off cackling up there!” 

“ Yes, love,” Mrs. Stafford answered, with a glance at the 
alabaster clock on the mantel. “ He’s let me stay up later 
than usual to-night. It’s only Mr. Stafford,” to Lottie, 
“ from the library down-stairs. Go to bed as quick as pos- 
sible, Lottie, dear, or Mr. Stafford won’t like it. 1 dare say 
you know where she’s to sleep, Eliza? 1 don’t.” 

“ Yes’m,” said Eliza, who, in common with the other 
servants, treated Mrs. Stafford with a sort of patronizing con- 
tempt, except in the presence of their master, whom they 
feared little less than the pope. “ 1 know. Come along, 
child.” 

And Lottie slept that night in a pretty room, furnished 
after some quaint Japanese fashion, with inlaid furniture and 
curtains of white and silver gauze— a room where everything 
smelled of sandal- wood, and the china dragons on the mantel 
made Lottie nervous until she had said her prayers. 

“ Well, child,” said Mr. Stafford, the next morning, as 
they sat down at the breakfast-table, “how do you like 
Staffordshire?” 

“ Is that the name of the place, sir?” asked Lottie. 

“Yes.” 

“ I think it’s beautiful!” answered Lottie. 

“ And the people, eh? How about the people?” persisted 
Mr. Stafford. 

“ I like them, too,” Lottie answered, with a bright, grate- 
ful smile. 

Mr. Stafford nodded his head and unfolded his paper. Mrs. 


74 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


Stafford, who had been breathlessly waiting to gain Lottie’s 
attention, gave her dress sleeve a little twitch. 

“ I know what you’re thinking of,” said Mrs. Stafford, in 
a low, eager voice. “You don’t understand why I haven’t 
got Number Fourteen on.” 

Lottie had completely forgotten about N umber Fourteen. 
She merely looked up into the lady’s pretty, dimpled face 
for an explanation. 

“ 1 never dress until noon,” said Mrs. Stafford. “ Mr. 
Stafford won’t let me. I wear morning-dresses until noon, 
and then you 3 11 see me in Number Fourteen. It’s not long 
to wait, is it?” 

“ Oriana, you’re a fool!” growled Mr. Stafford from be- 
hind his morning paper. 

“ Yes, love,” said Mrs. Stafford, subsiding into silence and 
stirring her coffee. 

After breakfast Mrs. Stafford withdrew to have a conference 
with one of the deputies of the famous Mme. Peronneau, who 
had come up from New Haven by early train that morning, 
on the subject of a dress to take the place of Number Twenty- 
two, which had been unfortunately discolored by the accidental 
spilling of a glass of lemonade on. its front breadth. Lottie 
wandered out into the front portico, for lack of anything else 
to do; but Mr. Stafford’s quick, high-pitched voice presently 
called her back again. 

“ Lottie,” said Mr. Stafford, “ come here.” 

And Lottie obeyed the summons. 

“ Lottie,” said Mr. Stafford, “ I’ve been watcning you. I 
think you’re a tolerably smart girl. I think you’d make your 
way in the world if you had a chance.” 

“ Indeed, indeed, I would!” cried Lottie, with sparkling 
eyes. 

“ Come, I’ll give you a chance,” said Mr. Stafford. “ I’ll 
send you to school. It’s an expensive whim of mine, but 1 
can afford to indulge an expensive whim, once in awhile, if I 
choose — ” 

“But,” interrupted Lottie, “ I’ll be sure and pay you 
back, sir, when I’m old enough to earn money for myself.” 

“ Will you hold your tongue?” said Mr. Stafford, imperi- 
ously, but not unkindly. 

“ Yes, sir,” said Lottie, laughing. 

“ You’ll do nothing of the sort,” said Mr. Stafford. “ I 
don’t wish nor intend to be paid back. Let me see— you’re 
thirteen now?” 

“ Thirteen and a half, sir,” said Lottie, proudly. 


LOTTIE AHD YICTOEINE. 


75 


“ Very well/’ said Mr. Stafford, “ Til give you three years’ 
schooling at a place where every year will tell . That will 
bring you to seventeen. But you’re to work right straight 
ahead, vacations and all. You’re not to go back to your re- 
lations at West Haven.” 

“ I don’t want to, sir, except for Victorine,” said Lottie. 

“ Victorine will do very well without you,” said Mr. Staf- 
ford. “You would only be a fire-brand in your old-maid 
aunt’s camp. And you’re to regard yourself as apprenticed 
to me for the next three years. Those are my terms. You 
can accept or leave ’em, just as you like.” 

“ 1 accept them, sir,” said Lottie, without hesitation. 

“Very well,” said Mr. Stafford, pleased with her prompt- 
ness. “ Then that’s settled. I shall send you to Mount 
Saco. I suppose you never heard of Mount Saco?” 

“No, I never did,” acknowledged Lottie, a little ashamed 
of her ignorance. 

“It’s not a fashionable school,” said Mr. Stafford, “but 
it’s a sensible one. Only fifteen girls taken, and every one 
thoroughly educated. And what’s more, the -education isn’t 
merely for young ladies to show off in a fashionable drawing- 
room, but a practical thing, which will wash and wear in 
every-day life. Every girl is given a bread-winner.” 

“ A what, sir?” said Lottie, in some perplexity as to 
whether she had fully comprehended his meaning. 

“ A trade— a profession. Call it what you will. Dress- 
making — teaching — telegraphy — book-keeping — something to 
make them useful and independent in the world.” 

“ I should like that, sir,” said Lottie, eagerly. “I want 
to earn my own living.” 

“ Very well,” said Mr. Stafford. “Mount Saco it shall 
be. Mrs. Stafford and Eliza shall fit you up with something 
to wear at once, and you’H be just in time for the fall term.” 

“ And I may write to Victorine?” 

“ Of course.” 

Mrs. Stafford was delighted. Next to dressing herself, the 
dressing of some one else was her delight, and although she 
cried .a little because her husband would not allow a single 
silk dress in the outfit, she soon reconciled herself to alpaca, 
debeige, and tweed. 

“ And really, my dear,” said she, “if you trim a dress 
tastefully, you can do wonders with it. And I’d cheerfully 
give you my set of Neapolitan coral, if — ” 

“ Oriana,” broke in Mr. Stafford, indignantly, “you’re a 
fool!” 


76 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


CHAPTER XIV. 

VICTORINE TAKES A SITUATION. 

But while Lottie Avenel was drinking the cup of not alto- 
gether unsuccessful adventure, and unconsciously unraveling 
the net-work of her own destiny, poor little Victorine was 
situated far less satisfactorily. Convalescence in itself is not 
an inspiriting business — but convalescence under the care of 
Miss Joanna Avenel, who, not being possessed of any nerves 
herself, entirely discredited their existence in others, was slow 
and melancholy enough. 

“Run away, eh?” was Miss AvenePs first comment when 
she heard of Lottie's abrupt disappearance. “ Let her run. 
She’ll be running back again fast enough, I dare say; but I’ll 
not take her in. She has made her own bed, and she may lie 
on it, for all of me. 1 wouldn’t give her a crust of bread to 
save her from starving.” 

You’re a cross, hateful old woman,” cried out Victorine, 
struggling up into a sitting position, with her pale cheeks 
dyed with momentary crimson, and her eyes blazing indig- 
nantly. “ And 1 should think God would punish you for 
talking so horribly.” 

And then Victorine fell back among her pillows, sobbing 
hysterically. 

“ Hoity, toity!” said Miss Joanna. “ Pretty talk that is 
to your aunt that’s supporting you, and taking the best care 
she can of you. If you wasn’t sick abed I’d take that sort 
of nonsense out of you pretty quick, or I’d know the reason 
why. ” 

And Aunt Joanna flounced out of the room, closing the 
door behind her with a bang that made Victorine’s head throb 
as if it were full of little red-hot hammers. 

Lottie’s letter, when it came, was a mine of satisfaction. 
Victorine kissed it, cried over it, slept with it under her pil- 
low, and could hardly satisfy herself with gazing on it, as she 
lay hour in and hour out among the pillows, that Aunt 
Joanna took so little pains to shake up or arrange. She read 
and reread it with feverish eagerness, almost fancying that 
she could hear Lottie speaking the words that were written. 

“ How I wish I were with her,” said Victorine to herself. 
“ I wonder— 1 do wonder, if I shall have courage to run away 
when 1 am well.” 

And Victorine almost made up her mind to the encounter. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


77 


Almost — for she was as different from brave, sanguine Lottie 
as the dove from the eagle, and could no more have faced the 
perils which Lottie had successfully wrestled with than the 
civilized Caucasian could endure the hardships at which the 
red Indian laughs. 

So when she got well again she settled down meekly and 
unresistingly into the old groove, doing a servant's work for 
Aunt Joanna, without the satisfaction of a servant's wages, 
snubbed, put upon, and generally made to comprehend that 
she was a most unwelcome dependent upon the bounty of her 
aunt. Lottie would not have endured it; she would have 
quarreled with Miss Joanna at the end of the week, and either 
have secured better terms or thrown up the situation. But 
Victorine was very different from Lottie. 

And so the time passed away, until Victorine was a tall girl 
of fifteen, when Miss Avenel came home one night from the 
post-office, with a resolute look in her face. 

“Victorine," said she, “how long have you been here, 
now?" 

“ Three years, Aunt Joanna," said Victorine, wondering 
what could be the meaning of that close-shut mouth, those 
watchful, twinkling eyes. 

“ Exactly," said Aunt Joanna. “ Well, / think three years 
is about enough. I can't support you any longer. I've made 
up my mind to go out and stay a year with Deborah Doolittle 
and her husband, in Kansas. They've writ for me to come 
and help 'em with their sewing and other work. I shall let 
this house to Abijah Steele. Abijali Steele offers me two 
hundred dollars a year. Two hundred dollars is not enough, 
but it is better than nothing, and I shall go next week!" 

Victorine looked into her aunt's face with varying color 
and dilated eyes. She felt as feels the shipwrecked mariner 
when he sees the spar which has hitherto been his sole security 
drifting off over the waves, beyond his straining reach. 

“ Can't I go with you. Aunt Joanna?" she asked, in tremu- 
lous accents. 

“No, you can't," said Miss Joanna, with a decision that 
settled the matter at once. 

Victorine burst into tears. “ But what shall 1 do?" cried 
she. 

“ Victorine, I've no patience with you," said Aunt Joanna. 
“ You're a born fool, if ever there was one! Do? what do 
other people do?" 

“ I'm sure I don't know," sobbed poor little Victorine. 


78 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


‘ They go to work and earn their own living,” said Miss/ 
Avenel. “ Now you can do the same thing, I suppose?” 

“ But how. Aunt Joanna?” 

“There’s plenty of ways,” said Miss Avenel. “Melissa 
Ann Spelman was telling me, only yesterday, that the young 
lady up at the Manor wanted a new maiid. What’s to pre- 
vent you trying for that place?” 

“ 1 don’t believe she would take me,” said despondent Vic- 
torine. 

“ You’ll never know until you try,” said Miss Joanna. 

“ Put on } r our things, and go right up there.” 

“ Oh, Aunt Joanna,” cried Victorine, clinging to her, 

“ won’t you go with me?” 

“ I suppose 1 can,” said Miss Avenel, sourly, “but I’ve no 
patience with those folks that hain’t no backbone of their 
own. ” 

So Victorine Avenel dressed herself in her best and walked 
up to Fordham Manor with her aunt, although she felt as if 
she would rather face the mouth of a cannon. 

There were two “ young persons ” beside herself sitting ex- 
pectantly in the little ante-chamber, into which Victorine and 
her aunt were shown, and she soon learned from their conver- 
sation that they also were applicants for the vacant situation 
of maid to Miss Sara Fordham. 

One was a French soubrette, very much dressed, and very 
confident that she had only to ask for any place in order to 
receive it at once— the other a sour-looking girl who had 
lived, as she informed Miss Avenel, “ with the very best 
families in New. York, and never failed to give satisfaction.” 
Mile. Euphrasie announced that she should expect twenty 
dollars a month, at least, and “privileges” innumerable. 
Miss Hester Prime said she had always received eighteen, and 
should be quite contented with that. Mile. Euphrasie said 
that her specialty was “ in the dress-making and the dressings 
of the hair, in a style that, grande del ! was truly of the most 
Parisian.” Miss Hester Prime sniffed contemptuously and 
remarked that “ wherever she had lived, she had found the 
American style to give perfect satisfaction.” 

While poor Victorine, looking from one to the other with 
startled eyes, felt the thermometer of her courage fast falling 
to zero. 

“ Aunt Joanna,” she whispered, drawing her chair close to 
that of the spinster, who sat in grim silence, as upright as a 
statue, “ let’s go away, I am quite certain I never can get 


LOTTIE AXD VICTORINE. 79 

the place. 1 don't know a thing about dress-making, and I 
never dressed any one's hair in my life." 

“ Hold your tongue and stay where you are," was Miss 
Joanna's uncompromising rejoinder. “ You haven't the 
courage of a chicken, and never had!" 

One by one the applicants were received in Mrs. Fordham's 
dressing-room, where that lady and her daughter considered 
the relative merits of the candidates. 

“ Well, my dear," said Mrs. Fordham to Miss Sara, when 
the door was closed at last on Miss Avenel and her niece, 
“ what do you think?" 

“ 1 like Mademoiselle Euphrasie the best," said Sara, medi- 
tatively resting her head on her hand. 

“ Yes; but, darling, she wants her meals upstairs, the use 
of a pony-phaeton, tea three times a day, and twenty dollars 
a month. Your papa will never consent in the world. " 

“The Prime woman is too cross and old-looking," said 
Sara. 

“ She never would dare to be cross with you , sweet?" said 
Mrs. Fordham, caressingly patting her daughter's hand. 

“ But I don't like to see such shriveled, snarly people 
around," said Sara, shrugging her shoulders. “ That little 
Victorine is a great deal the prettiest." 

“ She'll come for twelve dollars a month," said Mrs. Ford- 
ham, eagerly. For Mrs. Fordham, albeit she was a rich wom- 
an, was also a very stingy woman. A dollar was a dollar in 
her eyes — and the sharpest moments of her life were those 
when, with a pile of tempting greenbacks before her, she was 
compelled to pay them all out for the month's bills. ‘ ‘ And 
these young girls are never half so exacting about perquisites 
and such things as the old stagers that have lived out half 
their lives. Do you think you could get along with Victorine? 
The name sounds very well— almost as well as a French 
maid." 

“ She's so perfectly green, mamma," said Sara, with a 
grimace. 

“But she can easily learn, dear. I'll show her myself. 
And she'll come for twelve dollars a month. Besides, dear, 
the Avenels are quite respectable people, and I understand her 
father was quite the gentleman. She'll be a sort of com- 
panion to you as well as a maid, which Euphrasie and that 
stolid-looking Prime woman never could be. 1 really think, 
my darling, that I'll decide on Victorine." 

“Do as you please," said Miss Fordham, leaning listlessly 
back on the divan, and taking up her floss silk embroidery. 


80 


LOTTIE AND VICTOllINE. 


“ I presume we shall have to discharge her at the month’s 
end; but then, of course, that would apply equally to all ol 
’em. Servants are so trying. ” 

And, to the surprise of all three applicants, Mrs. Fordham 
sent out a maid to announce that “ missis had decided to try 
Miss AvenePs niece.” 

And so Victorine became, so to speak, a member of the 
family at Fordham Manor. She soon learned to dress Sara’s 
abundant flaxen hair in a variety of styles, to select her toilets 
with a native skill and taste equal to Mile. Euphrasie’s own, 
to be quick and dexterous at her needle, and to be of great 
use in a variety of ways, as well to Mrs. Fordham as to her 
daughter. Nor was she less a companion. Sara liked to be 
amused— Victorine amused her — and Mrs. Fordham, seeing 
how much more quickly Sara improved when Victorine was 
associated with her in anything, conceived the idea of allow- 
ing Miss Avenel’s niece to share in the lessons given by Mrs. 
Soper, the daily governess. 

“ It isn’t as if she were a regular lady’s-maid, you know,” 
said Mrs. Fordham to her husband. “ She belongs to a re- 
spectable American family, and her manners are really very 
modest and unassuming. ” 

So that, after all, Victorine Avenel was a great deal happier 
even in a situation which the world would regard as decidedly 
“ menial,” than she had been with her aunt. She felt, at 
least, that she was no longer an abject, helpless dependent. 
She was earning her own living and, at the same time, acquir- 
ing some fragmentary scraps of an education as she went 
along. To be sure, the situation at the Manor was not with- 
out its disagreeable features. Sara Fordham was a spoiled 
child, and was rather too apt to visit her ill-temper and 
caprices on Victorine Avenel, when there was no one else 
handy. Mrs. Fordham was petulant, unreasonable, and ab- 
surdly exacting, and Frank, now grown into a long-legged 
Yale collegian, had christened his sister’s little maid “ Que- 
bec Junior,” and tormented her with a thousand and one 
practical jokes, seeming to regard her as his natural prey 
when he was at home for the vacation. All this was hard to 
bear, and sometimes, when tried beyond her patience, Vic- 
torine would declare to herself that she would not bear it any 
longer. But our little heroine was of a conservative nature, 
and fully agreed with Shakespeare’s grand soliloquist, that it 
was better to bear the evils that she knew than fly to others 
that she knew not of. 

And there was many a sunny spot, a palm-boughed oasis in 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


81 


the path of her life. Letters from Lottie at Mount Saco 
came with commendable regularity — letters which to read and 
to answer was Victorine’s delight. There were times, also, 
when Sara was good-humored and companionable, Mrs. Ford- 
ham gracious, and Frank blessedly safe within the classic 
brick and mortar of Yale College — times of happy reading 
and pleasant occupation, when the girl could feel that she was 
making some progress along the path of learning. Some- 
times, too, she had abundant opportunity for practicing on 
Sara’s old nursery piano, when all the rest of the family were 
out driving or making visits in the big landau with the two 
gray horses. 

44 And very nicely she plays, too,” said Mrs. Beecham, the 
housekeeper, to a select audience consisting of the cook, the 
laundress, and two house-maids. 44 Better than Miss Sara, in 
my humble opinion. I never did fancy that there slashin’ 
way of gallopin’ over the keys as if you meant to break the 
instrument up into kindlin’ wood.” 

“ I dare say it’s all very well,” said the laundress, with a 
toss of her head. “ But she ain’t neither servant nor lady. 
I’d sooner be one thing or the other, and then I’d know my 
place. ” 

44 Time enough for that, time enough for that,” said Mrs. 
Beecham, wiping her spectacles. 44 A girl with a face like 
Victorine Avenel’s is pretty sure to make herself a place 
sooner or later in life.” 

From which remark may be gathered the very evident fact 
that, with all the rest, Victorine Avenel was growing passing 
fair to look upon. 


CHAPTER XV. 

LOTTIE’S LETTER. 

“ Is that the man come back from the post-office, Andrew? 
Are there any letters for me?” 

4 4 One, Miss Victorine.” 

For, although her daughter’s 44 maid ” might, and doubt- 
less would be on a level with the rest of the servants, Mrs. 
Fordham had strenuously insisted on her daughter’s 44 com- 
panion ” being treated with due deference and respect by the 
entire household — and Andrew, the coachman, respectfully 
removed his hat as he entered the wide hall where Victorine 
Avenel stood waiting. 

It was a sultry day in early J une. The air was deliciously 
scented with the hedges of roses, crimson, white, and yellow 


8 2 


LOTTIE AND YICTOKINE. 

in the garden, and the festoons of Japanese 
hung over the porches. The great elms in front of the house 
scarcely stirred in the languid breeze, butterflies floated to 
and fro, seeming to swim in the tides of afternoon sunshine, 
and birds sung in the quieter and shadier nooks at the back of 
the house. In short, it was one of those afternoons when the 
world wears its best and brightest aspect, and the veriest 
hypochondriac feels that it is sweet to live. 

The broad hall, which extended from front to back of the 
Fordham mansion, terminating in a pillared portico on either 
end, was one of the pleasantest resorts in the house in such 
weather as this. A rich Turkey carpet, figured in vivid crim- 
sons, greens, and purples, covered the floor, and sofas, tables, 
and arm-chairs were scattered carelessly around, as such things 
will be scattered in rooms that are in constant use. The four 
superb engravings, representing Cole’s “ Voyage of Life,” 
hung on the salmon-tinted walls, and a stand of books occu- 
pied the space between the two drawing-room doors, while on 
fluted bronze pedestals opposite, two gigantic china vases were 
filled with freshly cut roses, syringas, and trails of creamy, 
blossoming honeysuckles — vases which it was one of Victor- 
ine’s daily duties to replenish and arrange. 

This wide hall had, in former years, been kept in the prim- 
mest and trimmest of order, with the chairs set back against 
the wall, the sofa at a precise angle, and not a flower allowed 
in sight, “because,” Mrs. Fordham said, “ they were litter- 
ing their leaves around on the floor the whole time. ” But 
Sara, incited thereto by Victorine Avenel’s suggestions, had 
inaugurated a new order of things. 

“ Who ever heard of using a hall like a common sitting- 
room?” said Mrs. Fordham. “ And the chairs standing 
around as if we’d a sewing-circle here — and actually a writ- 
ing-table, with pen and ink, and the new Russia leather blot- 
ting-case that Frank brought from college last week; and 
flowers, and a basket of fruit. My dear, it really isn’t appro- 
priate.” 

“ Mamma, it’s all the style now,” pleaded Sara, while 
Frank, standing in the middle of the hall, with his hands in 
his pockets, put in his dictum on the side of the two young 
girls. 

“It’s the prettiest place in the house, mother,” said he. 
“ Quebec Junior understands how to arrange a room equal to 
a Parisienne. Just let her have things her own way, and 
you’ll have half the country patterning after your style.” 

It was into a low easy-chair close to the aforesaid writing- 


honeysuckle that 


LOTTIE AND VICTOKINE. 


83 


table that Victorine had nestled herself, with glistening eyes, 
and cheeks glowing with happy anticipations, to read Lottie’s 
letter. She knew she should have a quiet half hour to her- 
self, for Mrs. Fordham and Sara had driven into New Haven, 
shopping, and the squire was fast asleep in his study, and not 
a sound disturbed the stillness of the summer afternoon, save 
a blackbird in the drooping boughs of a Kilmarnock willow 
just outside, and Mackenzie, the gardener, whistling as he 
clipped off roses past their bloom for the housekeeper to dry. 

Yictorine Avenel, at sixteen, was tall and very pretty. 
Slender as a white lily, with a clear, pale complexion, large, 
dark-blue eyes, and hair of a rich chestnut brown, full of 
burnished lights and shades, and a full, crimson mouth; there 
was something princess-like in her beauty. She had a slow, 
stately way of carrying herself, an unconscious dignity in 
every motion., that Sara Fordham often secretly endeavored 
to model after. 

“ It’s too bad!” Sara would sometimes say to herself, after 
a long and intent study of the swinging, full-length mirror in 
her own room. “ I look exactly like a washer- woman, and 
Victorine Avenel, who, after all, is nothing but my maid, is 
like a court lady. It’s what old Doctor Dustiman calls the 
grand theory of compensation. I have the money, and Vic 
has the good looks. And I don’t know, if I had the oppor- 
tunity, but that I would exchange with her, and call it even.” 

And Sara Fordham stared discontentedly at her reflection in 
the truthful sheet of glass opposite. 

She, too, was tall and well made, although on a rather 
larger scale than Victorine Avenel, with a profusion of blonde 
hair, large, light-blue eyes, and a complexion which required 
ail of the cosmetic art to make it even passable. 

“ You’ll certainly spoil your skin, Sara, if you keep using 
that bismuth powder so much,” said Victorine, one day, 
shaking her head at Miss Fordham. 

“ I must use something,” said Sara. “ It's very well for 
you, with your face like a wax doll, but I’m one of the greasy 
kind— like cook when she’s getting up a state dinner. And 
just see how red and pimply my forehead is.” 

“ Cold water is the best cosmetic,” persisted Victorine. 

“ Oh, nonsense!” said Sara. “ You don’t know anything 
about it.” 

And Sara kept her own counsel about a row of little china 
pots and jars, in a certain secret drawer of her desk, of which 
she always carried the key on her watch-chain— jars labeled 
44 Rouge,” “ Poudre Blanc,” and “ Cream of Pearls even 


84 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


oue Lin}' vial labeled “ Arsenic/’ with elaborate directions, 
and an infinitesimal pair of scales for the weighing out of the 
exact “beauty dose.” For Sara’s complexion was her one 
sensitive point; and neither Victorine nor her own mother 
ever knew of the oatmeal poultices, the glycerine baths, and 
the Oriental pastes with which she bandaged up her unfort- 
unate face at night, only to wake to fresh disappointments in 
the morning. 

Of all these expedients Victorine had no need; and Sara 
Fordham sometimes envied her with a bitterness of envy 
which changed almost to hate. 

“ Dear .Lottie!” Victorine whispered to herself, as she 
pressed her lips to the closely written pages of her sister’s let- 
ter, ere she began to read it. “ Darling Lottie!” 

“ My own Victorine,” it began, “ 1 can’t tell you how 
delighted 1 was to get your photograph. Do you know, 
Vicky, you are growing very pretty? And so you are very 
happy with those Fordhams? It seems so strange to me that 
you should be so much at home in the house where I was 
dragged up as a culprit, nearly four years ago, my apron 
stained with apricot juice, my mouth tattooed purple, like the 
skin of a Feejee Islander. I know 1 shall quake all over with 
that old terror if ever I recross the threshold of Fordham 
Manor. But you always were the peaceable and docile mem- 
ber of the family. 

“ And now I must tell j r ou all my adventures since I last 
wrote. I’ve had lots of ’em.. I always do have lots of ad- 
ventures, you know. 1 told you about Mr. Stafford’s death 
— though, of course, you would hear that from the Fordhams. 
He has left all his property to Frank and Sara Fordham, with 
the provision that his poor little crack-brained wife is to have 
the life use of it. She has gone to Europe with her maid 
Eliza, to buy a mourning wardrobe, and it will probably take 
her the rest of her natural life to select it. Poor little thing, 
she was very good-natured. What a pity it is that good-nat- 
ured people are almost always fools. She sent me a watch 
and chain, a Homan gold locket, and a trunk iull of half- 
worn silk dresses, which are about as appropriate to my needs 
as if she had bestowed on me so many yards of cloth of gold. 
I sent them to a dress-maker who has plenty of what she calls 
‘ second-hand customers,’ and exchanged them off for a plain 
stone-colored alpaca and a plaid shawl — except one black silk 
which I kept for myself. It will do, with a little alteration, 
for my Sunday dress. The watch and the locket 1 kept also; 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


85 


Eliza thinks that Mr. Stafford meant to leave me a little 
something in his will, had he not been carried off so sudden- 
ly. But I don’t know that I had any right to expect any 
more than the good education he has given me. At all events, 
1 am quite content with that, and I shall always be grateful 
to kind old Mr. Stafford’s memory. 

“ And now, Yic, I’m going to astonish you! What do you 
think? I’ve got a situation, with a salary of three hundred a 
year to begin with, and my board. I am telegraph operator 
at the Folliott Mountain House, a railway station and hotel in 
the White Mountains. To be sure, I am condemned to live 
in a little railed-in box of a place, seven by nine, with a per- 
fect net- work of telegraph wires around me, and a perpetual 
clicking in my ears, as if half a dozen clocks had gone mad 
between ’em. Here I sit on a high stool and look out at peo- 
ple in an owl-like fashion, writing down their messages and 
wondering within myself what they are all about. Half the 
customers won’t believe that 1 am really the responsible per- 
son in charge, and ask: 4 Where’s the telegraph operator?’ 
To which I reply, with a little courtesy, 4 1 am, sir, if you 
please. ’ And then they look so astonished. The old gentle- 
men don’t seem to believe in me, and the young ones some- 
times take a great deal longer in writing their messages than 
they have any business to do, and stare at me in an absent- 
minded sort of way that makes me long to box their ears. 
And the ladies appear to have their doubts whether it is proper 
for me to be perched up here on such very friendly terms with 
electricity; but on the whole 1 get on very well. The salary 
is not large, but if I do well, the superintendent has promised 
to transfer me to what he loftily phrases, 4 A more lucrative 
post.’ And I mean to do well. I’m glad I studied teleg- 
raphy at Mount Saco. It’s a great deal nicer than cram- 
ming cube roots into the heads of stupid school-girls, or sell- 
ing gloves behind a counter, or combing out an old lady’s 
poodle dog, as companion or amanuensis. I can be as inde- 
pendent as I please in a very small way; and the best of it is 
— don’t laugh, Yic — that the landlord and hotel clerks treat 
me as if I were as much of a man as they are themselves. 
My room upstairs isn’t much larger than my office- below 
stairs, but Mr. Folliott says when the rush of travel is over 1 
shall have a larger one, and realty 1 am almost reconciled to 
sleeping with my head against the wall and one foot jammed 
into a bureau-drawer, when I look out of the window and see 
the grand spectacle of sunrise over Mount Washington. 
Sometimes it makes me cry, Vic; it is so wild, and glorious, 









86 LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 

and solitary. 1 take lots of long walks, and have got to be 
quite a mountaineer. And, on the whole, I don’t know but 
that I shall be sorry when the summons comes to that ‘ more 
lucrative post. ’ Because, to breathe the air here is like drink- 
ing champagne, and the grand mountains tower up against 
the sky like silent sentinels, and the beautiful Ammonoosuc 
River murmurs over its brown pebbly bed with such a per- 
petual song of rejoicing, and the woods are so wild and lovely. 

“ And then the people! It is such fun as I sit in my little 
den and watch them from behind my screen of plate glass, 
like a well-behaved wild animal. Some of them are such 
snobs, Vic! Only think: a lady arrived here yesterday with 
eighteen trunks, a regular incrustation of diamonds over her 
neck and hands, and a gold necklace as big as a dog-collar; 
and when she wanted to telegraph back to her husband about 
the nineteenth trunk, which it seems had been forgotten, 
would you believe it, the fact leaked out that she couldn’t 
write, and I had to take down the message verbatim et litera- 
tim ? But she would insist on signing her cross at the end of 
the message, ‘ lest,’ as she says, ‘ it shouldn’t be all right and 
legal.’ 1 sometimes think, Vic, that I shall take to novel 
writing one of these days and embody my experiences in a 
three-volume romance. For the present, however, I shall 
stick to telegraphing. 

“Now, darling, 1 have written enough about myself. 
Write back to me about yourselL Tell me all that happens 
in your daily life — all that interests you. Is Sara Fordham 
as homely as ever? Has Frank left off teasing? Give him 
Miss Quebec’s compliments, and say I am quite ready to 
knock his hat off a second time if he don’t behave himself. 
And, above all, dearest, dearest Vic, write soon to 
“ Your loving sister, 

. “ Lottie Avene l. 

“ To Miss Victorine Avenel, Fordham Manor (near New 
Haven), Conn.” 

Twice — nay, three times, Victorine read over the lines writ- 
ten in a clear, careless hand, more like that of a man than a 
woman, and then refolding it, she placed it in her bosom, 
murmuring to herself: 

“ Dear, dear Lottie! 1 watch and long for her letters, and 
yet they give me a homesick pang when 1 read them— a long- 
ing that leaves absolute pain, to see her once more— to clasp 
her to my heart. Four years— four long, weary years— since 


LOTTIE AND' VICTORINE. 


87 


we have seen each other. We were little girls then— we are 
grown women now. ? ’ 

She was still sitting with her eyes fixed on the little islet of 
shade that the great elm made on the lawn without, when an 
open barouche bowled lightly up the drive, and the tramp of 
horses’ feet broke the silence. Victorine started up. 

“ Sara has come home,” said she. 


CHAPTER XVI. 

SARA AND HER MAID. 

And Sara Fordham swept up the front steps in a plum-blue 
silk dress, with a Parisian hat, all butterflies and white blonde, 
perched airily on her flaxen chignon, a shawl of rich Chantilly 
lace fastened to her large, sloping shoulders with flat scarf- 
pins of enameled gold, and dark-bl ue gloves that fitted her as 
if they had grown to her well-shaped although rather large 
hands; while in her hand she carried a thread-lace parasol, 
with handle of carved mother-of-pearl, and a lining of plum- 
blue silk. Mrs. Fordham followed, in black silk, with a black 
lace hat loaded down with artificial cherries, and a cashmere 
scarf smelling of camphor lumps. While, behind the pair, a 
little page in buttons, who generally rode on the carriage box 
with the solemn coachman, toiled up the steps, both arms full 
of parcels and pasteboard boxes. 

“ Well, Vic,” said Sara, good-humoredly, “ have you been 
bored to death?” 

“ On the contrary, I have enjoyed myself very well,” said 
Victorine, quietly. “ I have just had a long letter from my 
sister.” 

“ What an inveterate letter- writer she must be!” said Sara, 
with a shrug of the shoulders. “But, come upstairs, Vic. 
I’ve got a piece of news for you.” 

“ For me?” 

“ Well, not for you especially, but for you and everybody 
in general, and myself in particular. Mr. St. Charles has 
come home.” 

“ Mr. St. Charles? Oh, yes! 1 remember now. The 
owner of that big Moorish palace on the Housatonic River.” 

“ Exactly,” said Sara, with a smile that liberally displayed 
her large white teeth. “ He’s in New York now. He will 
be at Charlesworth next week.” 

“ Well, but 1 don’t exactly see how all this concerns us /” 
said Victorine, unpinning the gold scarf-pins, and folding up 


88 


LOTTIE AND VICTOIUNE. 


Sara Fordham’s shawl previous to laying it in the satin-lined 
sandal-wood case, which was its especial depository. 

“ Oh, you goose! Here, take this bonnet. And you’ll 
have to put up my hair again before dinner. Those horrid 
bonnet pins have dragged it all down. Did you mend my 
dotted Swiss muslin and sew on the pink silk bows?” 

“Yes.” 

“ Then I’ll wear that, with the set of pink coral, and the 
coral arrow in my hair.” 

“ I wouldn’t, Sara. The pink coral is the least becoming 
of your sets,” urged Victorine. 

“ But I will,” said Sara, pettishly. “ And it isn’t for you 
to dictate what 1 shall or shall not wear. ” 

Victorine was silent. Sara recovered the equipoise of her 
temper in one moment, for she was of a light, good-humored 
disposition, when not ruffled by opposition or contradiction. 

“ Don’t be vexed, Vic,” said she. “ Of course I know best 
what is most becoming to my style. ” 

“ I don’t think you always do,” said Victorine, quietly, as 
she hung up the silk dress Sara had taken off and flung care- 
lessly over a chair. 

“ Oh, you horrid little crab!” said Sara, laughing. “ But 
about Mr. St. Charles. I’ll tell you why it concerns us. 
He’s as rich as Croesus and as handsome as Apollo; at least 
so people say, for 1 have never seen him, and Charlesworth is 
the prettiest place this side of the State line. And he’s a 
bachelor, Vic— and 1 mean to be Mrs. St. Charles. ” 

And Sara, meeting Victorine’s amused eyes in the mirror, 
before which she had seated herself, made a little grimace of 
determination. 

“ I dare say that is the intention of a good many other 
young ladies in this vicinity,” said Victorine, with a smile, as 
she began to unfasten the plaits of Sara’s thick, light-colored 
hair. 

“ But, you see, I shall have the first innings,” said Sara, 
gleefully. “ He has returned from Europe full three months 
before he originally intended— and as papa was an old friend 
of his father, he is to be invited here on Wednesday, to stay a 
week, while Charlesworth is being garrisoned with servants, 
and got ready for him. And papa is going to invite Doctor 
Marchlands and his daughter— Phoebe Marchlands is forty, at 
least, and as ugly as a Gorgon, so that she won’t be the least 
bit in my way— and Harry Bussell and his mother, and the 
two Silkfields. Frank is coming home for good about that 
time, you know, so we shall have a nice party. There’ll be 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


89 


croquet and archery parties, and all that sort of thing— and 
mamma says that a young lady in her own house can appear 
to the very best advantage, if only she chooses to take the 
trouble. And now, Vic, just undo that biggest parcel — the 
one with the pink twine around it, and see what you think of 
that shade of Nile-green silk. Isn’t it a delightfully cool 
color? Well, I want you to study up some especially pretty 
style for making that up. Something, you know, that every 
girl in New Haven hasn’t got. Will you? Something quite 
artistic and Frenchy.” 

“I’ll try,” said Victorine. 

“ And you know, dear,” added Sara, patronizingly, 44 if I 
should be married, and go to Charlesworth to live, you shall 
live with me all the same. Because I shall want a maid, of 
course, and nobody suits me as well as you.” 

“I am much obliged to you,” said Victorine— and Sara 
jerked her head around, at the imminent danger of having it 
transfixed by a hairpin, to see whether Victorine was in ear- 
nest, or whether she was laughing at her. 

She could not quite make out which was the case, and, 
after a momentary silence, broke forth again: 

“ Oh, Vic, I bought half a dozen Paris plates at Monsieur 
Sandolier’s, the hair-dresser — such lovely new styles, all puffs 
and plaits. You can practice on ’em at your leisure, and see 
which is most becoming to me. One gets so tired of these 
old ways that one sees reproduced on every factory girl’s 
head. I do think there ought to be a law that no poor girl 
should be allowed to imitate the ladies.” 

“ There certainly is a great deal of injustice in our laws,” 
said Victorine, dryly, and again Sara looked quickly around. 

*“ Vic, I do believe you are laughing at me.” 

“Did I laugh?” 

“ Your eyes did.” 

“ Well, Sara, who could help it? The idea that a girl 
shouldn’t be allowed to dress herself as she pleases, merely be- 
cause she is poor. Why, I’m a poor girl myself, am I not?” 

“ But you’re not an imitator, Victorine.” 

“ That’s because my taste doesn’t happen to lie in that par- 
ticular direction. Now, Sara, if you don’t sit still I never 
shall get your hair done in time for dinner.” 

If Victorine Avenel had wanted to forget Mr. St. Charles, 
she could scarcely have had an opportunity during the next 
few days, for Sara Fordham chattered incessantly concerning 
him. Mr. Fordham ordered a new suite of Eastlake furniture 
for the best room, which Victorine secretly thought very ugly 


90 


liOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


in its plain, severe lines and heavy, ornamentless angles; and 
the housekeeper and cook were driven nearly frantic by con- 
tradictory orders; and cards were sent out for a state dinner, 
with an engraved form of invitation: 

“ Mrs. Ferdinand Fordham requests the pleasure of Mr. 
So-and-so's company to dinner at the Manor on Wednesday, 
June 19th, at eight o'clock, to meet Mr. St. Charles, of 
Charles worth." 

And Sara sat up every night until twelve o'clock, keeping 
Victorine putting up and taking down her hair after at least 
forty different styles of coiffure. 

“ Because," said Miss Fordham, “it is absolutely essential 
that one should make a striking first impression." 

And on Saturday night, when Victorine, overcome with 
weariness and vigils, had piled up her young lady's hair in a 
Pompadour style, absolutely in her sleep, Sara viewed herself 
in the mirror by the light of two gasoline lamps, and declared 
herself satisfied. 

“You've hit it at last, Vic," said she. “It's perfectly 
lovely! I never looked so well in all my life." 

And Victorine, starting from her half-comatose state, be- 
held with some surprise the mechanical work of her own 
hands. 

“ I'm not sure that I could do it up so a second time," said 
she. 

“ Then get a piece of paper and a pencil at once," ordered 
Sara, who, unlike Victorine, could sleep as late as she liked 
in the morning, “ and sketch it immediately. Don't leave 
out a single detail. Sandolier himself couldn't improve on 
this." 

And so, with only half-concealed yawns, Victorine caged the 
fleeting idea with pencil and paper, much to Sara's delight. 

“Now you may go to bed, dear," said Sara, graciously, 
“ after you've put away my things and arranged the room a 
little, and made things generally neat." 

And Sara reflected to herself, as she mixed up the rose 
water anti glycerine with which she was at present fighting her 
refractory complexion, what a nice thing it was to have such 
an ingenious and handy young attendant as Victorine Avenel. 

“ Though," yawned Sara, “ mamma declares she is afraid 
we are spoiling her, having her at the table and in the draw- 
ing-room when we have no company, just as if she were one 
of ourselves. However, of course, that must be put a stop to 


LOTTIE AHl) VICTORIHE. 


91 


while Mr. St. Charles is with us. I must speak to Victorine 
about it to-morrow.” 

And she did, going right to the gist of the matter with the 
total want of tact which was one of the general characteristics 
of her nature. 

“ Victorine,” said she, bluntly, “ of course you won't ex- 
pect to be one of the family while we have company. I 
mean,” blundering on worse than ever, as Victorine looked 
up with a sudden flush on her cheek, “ you won't come to 
the table or sit in the drawing-rcom evenings. Mamma 
thinks it wouldn't be in good taste!” 

By this time the color on Victorine Avenel's face was of 
the deepest carmine; she bent closer over the rosettes she was 
sewing on Miss Fordham's satin slippers. 

“You need not have taken the trouble to mention it, 
Sara,” she said, quietly. “ My own good sense, would have 
taught me the lesson without. I should not have dreamed of 
forgetting my place. " 

“ You're not vexed, Vic?” 

“No; of course not.” 

“ And you won't forget to call me ‘ Miss Fordham,' just as 
if you never called me anything else when we are by our- 
selves?” 

“I shall forget nothing, Miss Fordham,” was Victorine's 
rather sarcastic reply. And Sara went back to her novel, 
satisfied that she had discharged her office in the most gra- 
cious and graceful way possible. 

“ Mamma thought she would be offended,” said Miss Sara 
to herself; “ but she isn't. Vic has too much common sense 
for that. ” 

While Victorine, sitting at her work, brushed away one or 
two very bitter tears before they could fall on the delicate 
satin of the slippers— tears of wounded pride and mortifica- 
tion. 

“ How I envy Lottie!” she thought — “ Lottie, who is in- 
dependent. And yet I don't think they mean to offend me — 
it is only their way. And we poor girls, who are dependent 
for our daily bread on the whims and caprices of others, can 
not afford to be oversensitive. ” 


CHAPTER XVII. 

SQUIRE FORDHAM'S DIHNER-PARTT. 

It was the evening of the great state dinner at Fordham 
Manor — as perfect an evening as if Mrs. Fordham had ordered 


92 


LOTTIE AKD VICTOItLKTE. 


it express, as she did her forms of ice-cream and forced hot- 
house peaches. There had been a bright, brief shower in the 
afternoon, just enough to clear the atmosphere and lay the 
dust, and now, at half past seven p.m., the lovely twilight 
was spangled all over with the golden dots of the summer 
stars, with a vivid glow of flame-color in the west, where the 
sun had dipped down behind the woods. 

Within doors all was ready. Every guest, with the solitary 
exception of the lion of the evening, had arrived. Wax can- 
dles were burning in silver candelabra on the dining-room 
table, an dpergne of red and white roses as big as a hay-stack 
adorned the center of the table, while at either end ferneries 
imbedded in moss reared their silver green plumes. The 
creams, ices, and confectionery temples had all arrived from 
New Haven in perfect order, much to the delight of Mrs. 
Fordham, who, as she was constantly reiterating, “ was quite 
certain something would be forgotten.” Lights glowed softly 
all over the house, flowers flung their subtle perfume on the 
air, and Mrs. Fordham and Sara were in the dining-room, 
talking to their guests, and secretly wondering what could 
possibly have happened to detain Mr. St. Charles, while the 
squire, down in the wine-cellar, was satisfying himself, by a 
personal inspection, whether the right wines had been put in 
ice. 

Mrs. Fordham was stately in black satin, with trimmings, of 
Valenciennes lace, and a set of diamonds so grand that they 
were ordinarily kept at the bank, and only brought to light 
for great occasions like this, while Sara, in the Nile-green 
dress, with pearl ear-drops and necklace, and her light hair 
dressed with ivy leaves, after the pattern Victorine had 
sketched at midnight on that Saturday night, looked as near- 
ly pretty as her unfortunate complexion would admit of. Mr. 
Frank Fordham was also present in a new suit of black broad- 
cloth and irreproachable gloves and diamond studs. Mr. 
Frank was not handsome, but he had an off-hand, winning 
way and a sort of good-humored audacity that went far to- 
ward supplying his lack of mere good looks. He was a gradu- 
ate from Yale, at last— not one of the first class men, to be 
sure, but still a graduate, and, as he flattered himself, “ ready 
to begin the world in good earnest.” 

“1 do hope you’ll marry early, Frank,” his mother had 
said to him that afternoon, as he lounged in her boudoir, 
waiting for his horse to be brought around. “ A young man 
in your circumstances can’t settle down too early.” 

, “Oh, nonsense, mamma,” was Frank’s undutiful reply. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


93 


“ A fellow must have his fling first. And all the girls around 
here are so deucedly plain/' 

Mrs. Fordham had found her good advice repulsed, and she 
was wise enough not to insist upon the matter just at that 
moment. But she resolved to keep a close watch upon her 
son, notwithstanding. 

“ I can trust Sara to take care of herself," said Mrs. Ford- 
ham, within her own soul. “ Girls are so reliable, especially 
girls like dear Sara. But boys are always entangling them- 
selves. And Mr. Fordham never does have any more idea of 
what's going on around him than yonder stone statue out on 
the lawn. I wish Victorine wasn't quite so pretty. Though 
Frank never takes any notice of victorine, except to tease 
her aud laugh at her — and we can easily discharge her, if we 
find she has any aspirations in that direction. Sara is very 
fond of her, to be sure, but everything must give way to dear 
Frank's future welfare!" 

In the meanwhile, the poor girl whose fate was being so 
summarily mapped out for her had stolen out upon the bal- 
cony of the study window to enjoy a little rest and a few 
breaths of the cool evening air, after the labors of Miss Ford- 
ham's toilet. Cards, and backgammon, and cribbage-boards 
had been laid out in the study, in case any of the guests 
should feel disposed to a quiet round game in the course of 
the evening, but all was still there, and Victorine knew that 
there, was no danger of this tranquil retreat being invaded for 
two or three hours as yet. 

As she paced to and fro on the balcony, now lost in the 
shadow of the elm-trees, now crossing the narrow ribbon of 
light cast by the great reflector lamp in front of the portico, 
her ear caught the quick tread of a hprse's feet coming up the 
drive, and a gentleman, mounted on a splendid chestnut steed, 
rode up, doffing his cap as he approached. 

“Miss Fordham, I presume," said he, and by the white 
glow of the reflector Victorine saw a pair of handsome eyes 
looking on her from a dark Spanish face. “ I owe you a 
thousand apologies for coming so late, but — " 

But Victorine felt that she must not allow him to go on 
any further. 

“ I beg- your pardon, sir," said she, “ but — I am only Miss 
Fordham's maid." 

She spoke the words with difficulty, her cheeks flaming 
h$t, and as she spoke she could see a quick change, subtle, 
and scarcely tangible, pass across the dark, handsome face. 


1)4 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


He bowed his head and rode up to the portico, flinging his 
reins to the servant, who came out at the same moment. 

For Oliver St. Charles, a born aristocrat, was a little 
chagrined that he should have been led into mistaking Miss 
Fordham’s maid for the young lady herself. 

“ I never made a mistake of this sort before/’ said he to 
himself, as he followed the footman upstairs to the bedroom 
and dressing-room set apart for his use, “ and I can not im- 
agine how I came to make it now.” 

While Victorine, flushed and indignant, she scarcely know 
whether at herself or the handsome stranger, hurried upstairs 
to her own apartment, a small room opening out of Miss 
Fordham’s dressing-room, to sob out her mortification, with 
her face buried in her own pillow. 

“ How his face altered into stone when he heard who 1 
was!” she murmured, passionately, to herself. “ But what 
else could I expect? It is neither his fault nor mine that I 
am — only Miss Fordham’s maid!” 

But there is an elasticity about youthful spirits which is all- 
powerful to cast off any burden — and, bitter as were Victor- 
ine Avenel’s tears, they were scarcely dry on her eyelashes be- 
fore she fell asleep, and dreamed that she, like Lottie, was at 
last “independent” in the world. Alas! that it should be 
only a dream. 

It was past midnight when Sara Fordham came upstairs in 
the highest possible spirits. 

“ Victorine! Vic! Where are you? Asleep? My gra- 
cious, how stupid of you to go to sleep when the house is so 
lively!” 

“ It isn’t very lively up here, at all events,” said Victorine, 
sitting up and rubbing her eyelids. 

“Ho, I suppose not,” admitted Sara. “ But oh, Vic, I’ve 
had such a delightful evening!” 

“ Had you?” said Victorine, beginning to unfasten Miss 
Fordham’s ornaments of pearl, and to take the hairpins from 
her chignon. 

“ He’s the handsomest man I ever saw — yes, the very 
handsomest,” went on Sara. 

“ 1 suppose you mean Mr. St. Charles,” said Victorine. 

“ Whom else should I mean?” petulantly retorted Sara. 
“ Not papa nor Frank, of course, nor yet Doctor Marchlands 
nor Harry Russell. They none of them make any pretensions 
to beauty. Of course, I mean Mr. St. Charles. He’s dark, 
with hair that is almost blue-black, the sweetest mustache, 
and those charming straight features that one never sees any- 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


95 


where except in a cameo. And his voice! He has such a soft, 
slow way of speaking, as if he never was in a hurry about any- 
thing. And I really think, Victorine, he is pleased with me.” 

“ Do you?” 

“Vic, how tiresome you are!” cried Sara, with an impa- 
tient movement of the slippered foot that was resting on an 
embroidered brioche. “You speak exactly as if you didn't 
believe a word 1 said.” 

“ But why shouldn't I believe it?” 

“ Yes, that's the very question?” retorted Sara. “ Why 
shouldn't you? Because you'll see for yourself one of these 
days. Do make haste with my things; I am so sleepy!” 

And Miss Fordham deigned no more confidences that night. 
But the next morning, when Mr. St. Charles had ridden 
into New Haven with Squire Fordham, to look after some 
packing cases which he expected from New York, Sara once 
again relapsed into confidential communications. 

“ I do think, Vic,” said she, “ he's the grandest person I 
ever saw.” 

“ You said something very like that yesterday,” said Vic- 
torine, demurely. 

“Yes, but he really is. I must contrive matters so that 
you can get a peep at him yourself, and then I'm sure you'll 
agree with me.” 

Victorine was silent; she did not care to tell Miss Fordham 
that she had already had a glimpse at the conquering hero of 
that young lady's imagination. 

“ Don't you believe a word she says, Victorine,” interposed 
Frank, who was lounging half in half out of the music-room 
window, a cigar in his mouth and a new novel in his hand. 
“ He’s in no way different from other people. A swarthy, 
black-browed sort of fellow, not half so good looking as your 
humble servant. ” 

And he nodded at her with a complacent smirk, which 
called an amused sparkle into her eyes. 

“ Do you think we have any doubt of that?” said Victor- 
ine. 

“ Then you really think me handsome?” questioned Frank 
Fordham. 

“ I never said that. ” 

“But you intimated it. Come now, Quebec Junior, be 
frank and confess.” 

“ I wish you wouldn't be so nonsensical,” said Victorine, 
laughing. 

“ No, but really! really, now!” persisted Frank. “ Since 


96 


LOTTIE AND VICTORIA E. 


1 have grown this beautiful mustache?’’ tenderly feeling the 
downy tuft of hair upon his upper lip. “Quebec Junior, 
you shall answer me.” 

“ I don’t respond to that name,” said Yictorine, stitching 
away at her work. 

“ Vic, then! Do own up that you think me good looking, 
or I’ll steal away your work-basket.” 

“Frank, don’t tease me,” said Victorine, a little shortly. 
“ I’m in a hurry with this collar, and I don’t want to be in- 
terrupted.” 

By way of answer, Frank leaned deftly forward, and 
twitched the half-finished piece of lace mending out of her 
hands. 

“ There! Now you shall attend to me,” said he, triumph- 
antly. 

“Frank, how can you be so hateful?” tartly demanded 
Sara. “Just look — you’ve torn that collar half across, and 
it was one of mamma’s point d’appliques that papa brought 
her from Paris. What will she say?” 

And poor Victorine, who knew by experience the probable 
weight of blame that would attach to her, in case of any ac- 
cident happening to the beloved old laces which Mrs. Ford- 
ham worshiped with ardent devotion, burst into tears. 

> For once in his life, Frank Fordham was really sorry for 
what he had done. 

“ Don’t cry, Quebec Junior,” he said, patting her head, 
with a clumsy attempt at consolation. “Don’t! The old 
rag of yellow lace isn’t worth those tears. I’ll go into New 
Haven and buy another one exactly to match it, before the 
old lady has a chance to find it out.” 

“As if they kept that style of collar in New Haven, or 
anywhere else on this side of the Atlantic!” said Miss Sara, 
scornfully. “ Much men know about fine laces.” 

“ I won’t have Vic crying, anyhow,” persisted Frank, as 
he drew both the young girl’s unresisting hands into his, pat- 
ting and stroking them as if she had been a child. 

Just then Miss Phoebe Marchlands’ dull, plethoric face ap- 
peared at the boudoir door. 

“ Sara,” said she, “ 1 came to ask you if— Dear me, what’s 
the matter? Is this young lady one of the guests in the 
house?” 

Victorine jerked her hand out of Frank’s grasp in a minute, 
and seizing her work-basket, glided out of the opposite door- 
way, leaving the brother and sister to explain matters the best 
they could. 




. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 97 

Five minutes afterward Sara swept into Victorine's room 
with that particular elevation of the nose and chin which 
always betokened an impending storm. 

“ Victorine,” said she, “ 1 was very much annoyed just 
now — and embarrassed, too.” 

“Why?” Yictorine demanded, looking her frankly in the 
eyes. 

“ I don't know what Phoebe Marchlands will think.” 

“ And I don't care,” said Victorine, a little curtly. 

“ Victorine, you are expressing yourself with unwarranta- 
ble freedom toward one of *our guests,” said Sara, bridling. 

Victorine made no reply, but bent closer over the gloves she 
was folding up. 

“ And while I’m about it,” said Sara, with increasing 
acerbity, “ 1 may as well speak about another subject. I 
think it is hardly fitting that you should allow yourself to be 
so familiar with my brother. It was all well enough while 
we were boys and girls together, but he is a grown man now, 
and — ” 

“ And I am only the lady's-maid,” broke in Victorine, with 
throbbing pulses and carmine cheeks. “ I comprehend your 
meaning perfectly. ” 

“ Well — yes,” said Sara Fordham, after a second's hesita- 
tion, “ it does amount to that.” 

“ Exactly,” said Victorine. “ But, Sara, you are hardly 
just in your criticisms. Is it I that am familiar with Frank — 
I beg your pardon; perhaps I should say Mfi Fordham — or is 
it he that is familiar with me? Was 1 the aggressor this morn- 
ing? Can you mention a single occasion upon which I have 
Avillingly sought his society?” 

“ N-no,” hesitated Sara, “ but — ” 

“ Then your chidings should be address*ed to him, and not 
to me,” said Victorine, with spirit. 

Sara flounced out of the room, muttering something about 
“ people forgetting their places,” and Victorine relieved her 
overcharged feelings with a good cry. 

Truly, life at Fordham Manor was no bed of roses,’ a fact 
that she was made a second time to realize when Mrs. Ford- 
ham discovered the torn collar, and read her a lecture full 
fifteen minutes long upon what she termed “ her unjwdona- 
ble carelessness.” 

To which Victorine could only listen in silence. 


i 


98 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


CHAPTER XVIII. 

A GAME OF CROQUET. 

Now that Mr. Sfc. Charles was fairly installed as a guest at 
Fordham Manor, the whole family felt how important it was 
that he should be kept amused and pleased in the place of his 
sojourn. The squire organized various fishing expeditions — 
Frank offered to match his father’s guest at billiards “ any 
time of the day or night,” to use his own expression, and got 
very badly beaten at that favorite pastime of his. 

“ However, I don’t mind that,” he said to Harry Russell, 
who was more evenly pitted against him. “ Those fellows 
pick up all sorts of wrinkles in foreign countries. It’s first- 
rate good practice, playing with him.” 

While Miss Fordham and her mother ransacked their brains 
for croquet, archery, dancing, breakfasts, strawberry teas, 
and all such feminine modes of amusement. And not with- 
out success. 

Mr. St. Charles had been at the Manor about a week, when 
one hopelessly rainy morning brightened into blue skies and 
sparkling sunshine. Mrs. Fordham was at her wits’ end. 
She had sent out invitations for a little impromptu charade 
party for that evening, but here was a long June day to pass 
first. 

“ My dear,” said Mrs. Fordham to Sara, “ what shall we 
do? He’s in the library now, looking over that big illustrated 
Hon Quixote of your papa’s; and I’m sure he must be bored 
to death. ” 

“ Croquet,” suggested Sara. “ He told me yesterday he 
was very fond of croquet. ’ 9 

“ But you haven’t enough to play.” 

“ Yes, we have. There’s Mr. St. Charles, and Frank, and 
Miss Marchlands, and — ” 

“ Miss Marchlands is in bed with a sick headache.” 

“Miss Russell, then,” suggested Sara. 

“ She has gone to spend the day with the Villars family, at 
the cottage.” 

“Then, mamma,” said Sara, reduced to desperation, 
“ you’ll have to play.” 

“ I, my dear? When you know perfectly well that I don’t 
know croquet from cribbage.” 

“ But you could learn, mamma.” 


LOTTIE AND VICTOR INE. 


99 


“ With my rheumatism, out on the damp grass! Sara, you 
must be crazy !” 

“Perhaps papa would take a mallet?” said Sara, with a 
faint gleam of hope. 

“ Papa drove into New Haven this morning to see about 
the new carriage-horses, and he won't be back until night.” 

“ Then,” said Sara, rapidly revolving the pros and cons of 
the question in her mind, 4 4 there's no help for it; Victorine 
must be asked to join us. She plays a capital ball, and has a 
very fair idea of aiming.” 

“ But, my dear,” remonstrated Mrs. Fordham, “ is it quite 
* appropriate? Mr. St. Charles to be asked to play with your 
maid!” 

“ Nonsense, mamma,” retorted Sara. “ He won't know 
she is my maid. Let him think she is a companion, or some 
such sort of thing. Anything is better than to let him get 
dull and bored. I'll call her at once — she's upstairs, finish- 
ing that strip of embroidery for my chair back that I com- 
menced last fall. " 

So that Mr. St. Charles, who was, in reality, quite well 
amused with his own society and a superb illustrated edition 
of Spain's great humorist, was summoned out upon the lawn 
to take part in a game of croquet. 

“ And who is to play?” asked Mr. St. Charles, as he took 
up a mallet with a gayly striped red handle, and critically ex- 
amined “ the lay of the land ” as regarded aims. 

“Oh! Frank and myself,” answered Sara, “and — and a 
young person who is here as my companion. Mr. St. Charles 
— Miss Avenel.” 

Victorine stepped forward from a cluster of glossy-leaved 
laurels as Sara pronounced the words of introduction, and Mr. 

, St. Charles bowed courteously, never by look or glance be- 
traying his consciousness that she was the young girl he had 
seen on the balcony the evening he first came to Fordham 
Manor. 

“I'll have Vic for my partner,” called out Frank, bal- 
ancing his mallet perilously on the palm of his outspread 
hand. “I understand her style of play precisely. You'll 
have to put up with Sara, St. Charles.” 

“ I could hope for no better partner,” said Mr. St. Charles, 
gallantly. Nor was Miss Sara discontented with this arrange- 
ment of the game. 

Victorine Avenel was a good player, skillful beyond the 
average, cautious in strategy, and correct in her aim. Mr. 
St. Charles, who had launched his first ball into the affray 


100 


LOTTIE AND VICTOKINE. 


with a careless conviction of superiority, which was born of 
one or two previous games with his fair hostess, soon per- 
ceived that he must alter his tactics if he would hope to win 
the game. 

Leaning against the trunk of a linden-tree, he watched Vic- 
torine as she aimed her ball straight at the middle arch. 

“ A perfect young Diana,” he said to himself. “ As grace- 
ful as a Greek statue — and what is best of all, she never once 
stops to think of herself. I think it is the loveliest oval face 
1 ever saw.” 

“Go on, Frank,” called out Sara, as Victorine paused, 
with brilliant eyes, and lips half apart. 

She had never looked so well in her life, had she but known 
it, as at that moment, in her plain blue cambric dress, with 
not so much as a brooch at her throat or a ribbon in her 
golden-brown hair. Mr. St. Charles almost forgot his game 
in the intensity of. his study of this fair human picture. 

“ She is like the picture of Evangeline that hangs up over 
my study table,” he thought. “ 1 should like to sketch her 
just in that graceful, unconscious attitude. ” 

“Halloo, St. Charles, what are you dreaming about?” 
shouted Frank. “ It's your play.” 

“1 beg your pardon,” said Mr. St. Charles. “ 1 was not 
aware that it was my turn.” 

And once more he applied himself to the chances and 
changes of the game, with a will that more than neutralized 
Sara's feeble and inefficient play, and finally won the game. 

“ It's all the fault of this deuced, sloping ground,” growled 
Frank. ‘ ‘ 1 say, St. Charles, Vic and I could beat you into 
the middle of next week on your ground at Charlesworth. 
They tell me it's as level as a floor there, and the grass kept 
down like velvet. ” 

“Frank! Frank!” remonstrated Sara, plucking at his 
sleeve. 

“ Will you give me the opportunity of proving your asser- 
tion, Mr. Fordham?” said St. Charles, quickly. “ And shall 
we appoint next Wednesday as the day of battle?” 

“ Do you mean at Charlesworth?” 

“ Of course I mean at Charlesworth.” 

“Oh, Mr. St. Charles,” said Sara, “you're not going to 
leave us so soon?” 

He turned courteously toward her. 

“ One can not expect to live always in Paradise, Miss Ford- 
ham; and a forlorn old bachelor like myself must, sooner or 
later, return to the life that is marked out for him in his 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


101 






own solitary den. I must leave you on Saturday, but I hope 
you will all honor me by coming to Charlesworth on the fol- 
lowing Monday, for as long a sojourn as you can spare me. 1 
expect a friend from the West on Saturday night, and it is 
necessary that I should be at home to receive him. ” 

“I'm sure,” said Sara, scarcely knowing whether to be 
vexed or pleased, “ mamma would be delighted to have you 
invite your friend here.” 

“■I am quite certain of that,” said St. Charles. “Mrs. 
Fordham is only too kind and hospitable. But 1 feel that I 
must not trespass too far on her good nature. So, if you will 
come to Charlesworth on Monday, I will institute a regular 
croquet tournament for the Wednesday following. Of course,” 
with a glance and a bow in the direction of the slim figure in 
blue cambric who stood so silently, “ I shall hope to be hon- 
ored by the presence of Miss Avenel, also.” 

“ Thank you,” said Yictorine, almost inaudibly. “I am 
very much obliged to you, but I fear I must decline.” 

“ Decline? What for?” demanded Frank Fordham, turn- 
ing sharply toward her. 

“ I fear that Mrs. Fordham will scarcely be able to spare 
me,” said Victorine, feeling the color grow deeper and deeper 
in her cheeks. 

“Yes, she will,” said Frank, as if his dictum settled the 
whole question. “ I’ll see to that. She’ll come, Mr. St. 
Charles. And mind, Vic, you’re to play partners with me 
again. It’s a bargaiu, eh?” 

But Victorine paid no heed to this noisy challenge, but 
merely murmured something about “hearing Mrs. Fordham 
call,” as she glided away through the shrubberies — and so 
the croquet party disbanded. 


CHAPTER XIX. 

FRANK HAS HIS OWN WAY. 

Upon the whole, Sara Fordham did not know whether to 
be most pleased or vexed by the turn that affairs had taken. 
Of course Mr. St. Charles had invited Victorine Avenel mere- 
ly to gratify her , Sara. It was a most delicate attention on 
his part, and really the girl might make herself very useful at 
Charlesworth, only it was not a good precedent to admit Vic- 
torine to a level with herself, when, after all, she was nothing 
more than a paid dependent. And then, again, Frank had 
no business to espouse the question in that sort of way, as if 
he had anything to do with the matter. Sara thought that 


102 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


Frank was beginning to pay too much attention to Victorine. 
Not that it amounted to anything, but it would spoil the girl 
to be so noticed and “ set up.” No, Sara decided within her- 
self, as she trailed her dress over the grass, leaning on Mr. 
St. Charles's arm, toward the front portico — Victorine must 
not accept the invitation. It would be decidedly out of place. 

“ Very well,” said Frank Fordham, flinging his cigar out of 
the window, with a vicious aim toward the nose of a marble 
Mercury, who was poised, in mid-career, amid a group of 
rhododendrons outside. “ Very well. If Vic isn't to be of 
the -party to Charles worth, then I’m not going. Not a step. 
Barker and Vyvyan have asked me to go yachting up along 
the Maine coast with them, and it'll be a deuced sight pleas- 
anter than to be playing propriety and dancing the german 
up at St. Charles's place. I'll write to Vyvyan to-night.'' 

Mrs. Fordham grew pale. Barker and Vyvyan were among 
the black sheep of Yale whom she most disliked and feared — 
regular skirmishers on the outer ranks of society— -who spent 
their days in smoking, their nights in playing cards and drink- 
ing Rhine wines. Anything was better, in Mrs. Fordham's 
eyes, than for her son to fall a prey to their devices. 

“Oh, Frank, don't!” was all that she could find voice to 
utter at first. 

“ Why shouldn't I?” demanded the ruffled heir. 4 ‘ Does 
any one take any pains to please me?” 

Mrs. Fordham wrung her hands — the big-jointed, bony 
hands, that were as ill-shapen and as heavily laden with rings 
as ever. It was a clear case of Scylla and Charybdis. Barker 
and Vyvyan, with their cards and wine on one side; Victorine 
Avenel's blue eyes on the other. And how was she to choose 
between them? 

“ Frank! Frank!'' said she, “ you're not allowing yourself 
to get too fond of that little country servant-girl?— for she's 
nothing else, after all.” 

“ Nonsense, mother,” said Frank, bursting into a derisive 
laugh. “ That's some of the absurd stuff Sara's been putting 
in your head. As if a man couldn't look at a pretty girl with- 
out meaning a wedding-ring and cards. Too fond of Vic! 
That is a good one. Why, we've grown up together, just 
like brother and sister, haven't we?” 

“ Yes,” hesitated Mrs., Fordham, “ but—” 

“ Then what's the use of all this palavering? I’m not 
quite a fool, am 1?” 

44 Of course not, dear, only — ” 

“But you see,” unceremoniously broke in Frank, 44 Vic 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


103 


has a way of making it lively wherever she is. She under- 
stands society a great deal better than Sara does, with all her 
airs and graces. And she understands my style of croquet 
exactly.” 

“Well,” unwillingly admitted Mrs. Fordham, “if you 
really insist upon it, I suppose Victorine must go. But I’m 
sure I don’t know what Sara will say.” 

“Just tell her to mind her own business, if she cuts up 
rough,” said Mr. Frank Fordham, reassuringly. “ I can 
easily block her little game with St. Charles, if she chooses to 
make herself disagreeable.” 

Miss Fordham did make herself uncommonly disagreeable 
when her mother’s final decision was communicated to her. 

“ Victorine Avenel shall not go one step,” said she, knit- 
ting her brows into an ominous frown. “ Not one step. I 
am astonished at you, Frank, for venturing to propose it — 
still more at mamma for consenting.” 

“ But, my love — ’’ feebly began Mrs. Fordham, who was 
tossed backward and forward on the waves of her children’s 
contending wills, without even the proverbial straw to cling to. 

“It’s no use arguing, mamma,” said Sara. “ Frank has 
talked you over, against your own common sense. 1, for one, 
will not listen to the idea.” 

And she swept out of the room in a tempest of indignant 
protest, leaving Mrs. Fordham gazing helplessly after her. 

“ Never mind her, mother,” said Frank, soothingly. “ I’ll 
bring her around in no time at all. ” 

And he strode after her, whistling “ Love’s Young Dream ” 
in most provoking composure. 

“ I say, Say,” he called out, twitching at the long blue sash 
that floated behind her, “ hold on a bit! I want to speak to 
you.” 

“Is it about the matter we have just been discussing?” 
asked Sara, without turning her head. 

“ Partly yes, and partly no.” 

“ Then 1 decline to listen.” 

“You’d better. Say.” 

And with one deft stride he placed himself in front of her, 
thus checking her progress for the moment, whether she would 
or not. ^ 

“ You remember those letters you wrote to Karll Vyvyan, 
Say?*’ he said, looking her full in the eyes. 

Her color changed to scarlet. 

“ What letters?” she asked, in a husky voice. “ You said 
they were burned.” 


104 




LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 

“I didn’t say they were burned; I said I had got ’em back 
from him to burn. But I haven’t burned ’em yet. And I 
swear I won’t until the whole family, ay, and your fine friend 
Mr. St. Charles into the bargain, have had the whole benefit 
of them, if you’re going to set yourself up in direct opposition 
to me.” 

“ There — there were only two of them!” faltered Sara, 
plucking nervously at the lace drapery of her sleeve. “ 1 was 
only fifteen when 1 wrote them, and didn’t half know what 1 
was about. And it was all your fault, bringing Vyvyan 
home for that vacation! Frank, let me have those letters!” 

“ Not if I know it,” said Frank, setting his lips close to- 
gether. “I’ve got ’em, and I mean to keep ’em. But I’ll 
keep ’em to myself if you’ll promise to behave like a good 
girl.” 

“ How?” 

“ Let Vic Avenel go to Charles worth with us.” 

“ You are getting altogether too much interested in Yic 
Avenel,” sneered Sara. 

“ Not half as much as you were in Karll Vyvyan,” said .1 
Frank, with a grimace. “ Don’t look so scared. Say. I’ll 
keep good faith with you, indeed I will. / don’t care two 
straws for Vic, only 1 owe her a good turn for getting her such 
a confounded lecture about the point de — what-do-you-call-it 
collar, the other day. And she has so few treats. Come, 

Say, that’s a darling.” 

“ If you’ll give me the two letters.” 

Frank’s brow darkened. 

“ No!” he exclaimed, clinching his hands. “ I’ve said so 
once before, and I mean it. And if you really want me to de- 
clare war a Voutrance — ” 

“ Don’t be unreasonable, Frank,” said Sara, biting her lip 
until the blood came. “ Yes, if you really wish it, she shall 
come.” 

“ That’s my own Say,” said Frank, kissing her forehead— 
a very unusual sign of fraternal affection on his part. And as 
he retreated down the hall he said, within himself: 

“ What jolly fools girls are, to be sure! The letters that 
poor Say is so afraid of were burned long ago, but they’re just 
as useful to me as if they weren’t. A woman can be as hate- 
ful as Old Nick himself, if you haven’t got some sort of a 
sword to hang over her head.” 

When Sara Fordham went to her room that afternoon— it 
chanced to be the one preceding the proposed visit to Charles- 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


105 


worth — she found Victorine busy in la}'ing out the dresses 
which were to be worn during her absence. 

“ I am glad you are come, Sara,” said she. “ I was won- 
dering whether you cared to take the lilac silk. It is so warm 
for silks, and — ” 

‘‘Oh! take it, of course,” said Sara, listlessly. “ Have you 
put up any of your things yet, Victorine?” 

“My things!” Victorine raised her large blue eyes to the 
other's face in surprise. “ 1 am not going.” 

“ Yes, you are,” said Sara, pettishly. “ Of course you are 
going. How could I get along without you to fix my hair 
and arrange a,bout my dresses?” 

“But 1 really would rather remain at home, Sara. And 
you said yourself, only yesterday, that it was absurd for Mr. 
St. Charles to ask me. ” 

“ One hates to have one's words thrown continually in 
one's teeth,” said Sara, with an impatient shrug of the shoul- 
der. “ I wish you hadn’t such a memory, Vic. Of course I 
said so, and 1 thought so then. But I’ve changed my mind 
since. You're to go. That's the end of it. ” 

“ But if 1 were to instruct your mother’s maid just how I 
do your hair — ” 

“ Vic, how teasing you are this afternoon!” Sara impa- 
tiently broke in. “ My head aches, and I don't want to be 
tormented. I want you. That’s enough. Why, I should 
think you would be half wild to see Charlesworth, when you've 
heard so much about it. ” 

“ I should like to see Charlesworth well enough,” said 
Victorine, slowly, “ but I don't think 1 can go as — as your 
maid.” 

“ Didn't Mr. St. Charles ask you himself? And did he 
say anything about your being a maid?” flashed Sara. 

“ He did not, perhaps, comprehend all our domestic 
arrangements,” answered Victorine, half smiling. “ And 
besides, 1 think, Sara, he only asked me to please you.” 

Sara's face brightened. 

“ Don’t let’s argue the question any further, Vic,” she said, 
with returning good-humor. “ I want you to go— and that 
settles it.” 


CHAPTER XX. 

CHARLESWORTH. 

It. was late on a June afternoon when the party from Ford- 
ham Manor, snugly packed in the landau, whose top had been 


106 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


laid back by universal consent to admit the free air and sun- 
shine, came in view of the " Moorish Palace/' as the country 
people called Mr. St. Charles’s place upon the Housatonic 
River. 

Gilmour St. Charles, the father of the present proprietor, 
had been a traveler and a dilettante, and spent much of his 
life in Spain, even carrying his admiration for the land of the 
Alhambras so far as to take unto himself a wife from an an- 
cient Castilian family, with a pedigree a good deal longer than 
their purse. And that was where Oliver, the only child, got 
his straight features, dark complexion, and blue-black hair. 
Returning, a young widower, to his native land, he built, on 
the shores of the Housatonic River, a superb house, which he 
designed to be at once a residence for himself and a memorial 
to the tastes and fancies which had once been those of his 
wife, the lovely young Donna Olivia. It was constructed after 
the model of an ancient Spanish castle which Olivia had much 
admired — a series of inclosed courts, each a tropic garden in 
itself, with fountains, statuary, and grottoes in the center, 
rows of colonnaded porticoes, and great echoing rooms, fur- 
nished with a magnificence that would, perhaps, become 
gloomy a century hence, but was now sumptuous and splendid 
in an extreme degree. All the rooms opened into one another, 
an endless suite divided only by rows of marble or malachite 
pillars, draped with hangings of satin or velvet, with here and 
there a pretty little surprise in the shape of a marble-paved 
court, with an arched glass roof overhead, brushed by the fan- 
like leaves of tropic palms, and musical with the murmur of 
hidden cascades and silver-dropping fountains. 

All through the house the floors were of white, red, and 
black marble, laid in a bewildering variety of patterns, while 
the windows were single sheets of plate glass, and the ceilings 
were tinted by artistic pencils. Nothing was like other 
houses; everything was beautiful. Gilmour St. Charles had 
been an artist at heart, although himself ignorant of the 
practical combinations of pencil and canvas; consequently, 
his home was full of rare and costly paintings of every style 
and school. He was a beauty-lover, so that every room 
teemed with flowers, and birds, and rare statuettes in bronze 
and Parian. In fact, Charlesworth was one of those houses 
where a man’s character is, as it were, shadowed forth in 
every nook and corner. Gilmour St. Charles was dead years 
ago. His dust lay far away in a foreign cemetery, shadowed 
with oleander and orange boughs, but the “ Moorish Palace 9 9 
was kept as beautiful and spotless as ever, a memorial of his 


LOTTIE AND YICTOHINE. 107 

life and tastes, a mute testimonial to his undying love for the 
fair young wife who had died when her child was born. 

Mrs. Fordham’s first thought was that Charlesworth was a 
most “ outlandish place,” the second that it was beautiful 
beyond the power of words to express. The Fordham idea of 
magnificence consisted in great square rooms, carpeted and 
furnished according to a certain design, with so many chairs, 
so many sofas, and so many pictures distributed at even dis- 
tances — and this was something so different that she was com- 
pletely taken by surprise. 

A respectful man-servant in black ushered them to their 
rooms, which were on the second floor of the house, opening 
outside on a veranda where slender shafts of marble upheld a 
frescoed roof, and inside on a circular railed gallery hung 
with old tapestry and Spanish banners, where you looked 
down into a round court, paved with checkered marble, in 
which a fountain threw its stream of crystal ten or fifteen 
feet into the air, and fell back into a fringe of calla-lilies and 
purple-crested hydrangeas. 

“ Dinner is at seven,” said the respectful functionary, with 
a bow as imperial as if he were an exiled emperor. “ Tea 
will be served in your apartments directly. Mr. St. Charles’s 
compliments, and he hopes you will make yourselves entirely 
at home. ” 

And the Fordhams, who had supposed a week ago that they 
were rather astonishing Mr. St. Charles by the splendor of 
the Manor, looked at one another in bewildered silence. 

All but Frank, who, on perceiving that a small smoking- 
room, fitted up in genuine Oriental style, opened out of his 
own, expressed his opinion in brief but forcible phrases. 

“ By Jove! this St. Charles fellow is a brick! 1 hope Say’ll 
manage to net him, and if she does. I’ll stay three quarters of 
the year with her, blest if 1 don’t! This sort of thing suits me 
exactly.” 

While Sara’s large, light-blue eyes took in everything with 
a greedy delight. 

‘‘Oh, Vic,” cried she, “isn’t it splendid? Why did ice 
never think of such decorations as these? But of course Mr. 
St. Charles is a great deal richer than we are. And only 
think, Vic, if 1 should be lady of this superb castle, wouldn’t 
it be delightful?” 

Victorine smiled. 

“ Did you ever hear, Sara,” said she, “ of the girl who took 
her eggs to market — and broke them all while she was mak- 
ing a courtesy to her imaginary lover?” 


108 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“ Pshaw!"’ said Sara. 

Mr. St. Charles was in the great- central saloon to meet 
them when they came down-stairs. 

“ Charlesworth is more highly honored to-day than it has 
been for many a long year/’ said he, with one of those 
gracious bows which Sara Fordham was wont to declare had 
something prince-like about them. “ You are all more than 
welcome. I have invited a few neighbors to join us at dinner, 
and I shall presently have the pleasure of introducing to you a 
particular friend with whom I traveled in the Holy Land last 
winter — Mr. Churchleigh. He arrived quite unexpectedly this 
morning, and I think you will find him a most delightful com- 
panion. Miss Fordham, I believe you have not yet seen my 
fernery. Are you interested in such things?” 

“ Oh, I dote on them!” said Sara, who didn’t know an 
“ Adiantum ” from a “ Pteris.” 

She went exultantly away, leaning on Mr. St. Charles’s 
arm, while Mrs. Fordham smoothed down the flounces of her 
violet moire antique dress, and smiled complacently to herself 
at the sight. 

“ Wouldn’t they make a handsome couple, dear?” she 
asked, nudging the squire with her elbow. The squire looked 
up from his evening paper and. smiled a smile that was elo- 
quent beyond all words. 

While Mr. Frank Fordham stalked up and down one of the 
marble-paved courts, smoking his cigar and wondering where 
on earth St. Charles got those outlandish, big-leaved trees 
whose shadows trembled on the tesselated floor. And Vic- 
torine, her duties completed in Miss Fordham’s room, asked 
the gentlemanly servitor in black where she should find the 
library. 

“If I could get a book,” thought she, “ the time would 
not pass so heavily.” 

Mr. Howerson, who was a sort of major-domo, general 
steward, and groom of the chambers at Charlesworth, court- 
eously showed her the way, lifting for her the velvet portieres 
of the door and holding them open for her to pass through. 

“ Shall I have the honor of waiting to conduct you back?” 
he asked, with a politeness that was almost oppressive to poor 
little Yictorine. 

“Oh, no, thanks,” she answered, hurriedly. “I shall 
have no difficulty in finding my way.” 

Mr. Dowerson bowed like a modern Sir Charles Grandison, 
and Yictorine crept into the library, feeling very insignificant 
indeed. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


100 

It was a large, high-ceiled room, with oriel windows of 
frosted glass, bordered around with narrow lines of blue and 
crimson and amber, a Turkey carpet covering the center of 
the floor, and revealing, around the edges, the inlaid wood, 
oiled and polished like a mirror. A large velvet-covered table 
stood in the middle, heaped high with pamphlets, magazines, 
and writing implements, and one entire side of the room was 
lined with cases of books, protected from dust or tarnish by 
plate-glass windows. A tall Vesuvian vase on the table was 
full of- roses, and a gilded aviary of birds warbled in the sunny 
south windows. 

As Victorine advanced toward the table, she became sud- 
denly conscious, much to her annoyance and embarrassment, 
that the room was not empty. A middle-aged gentleman, 
with his back toward her* was sitting at a side-table, writing. 

Her first impulse was to draw back and beat as rapid a re- 
treat as possible, as the stranger evidently did not see her. 
But the subtle magnetic current that flows, like a soundless 
river, between two human presences, had already telegraphed 
to the other occupant of the room the fact that he was no 
longer alone, and even at the moment in which Victorine 
paused irresolutely, he turned around, lifting a pair of very 
peculiar eyes, large, dark, and rather near-sighted, to her 
face. 

And with an incredulous shriek of recognition, Victorine 
Avenel found herself gazing into the well-remembered face of 
— her own father! 


CHAPTER XXI. 

VICTORINE AND HER FATHER. 

Of her own father! Of the very man whom she had for 
years believed to be buried beneath the foaming sepulcher of 
Montmorenci Falls. Of the handsome, debonair father whom 
she and Lottie had mourned and wept over as dead — whose 
memory they had lovingly treasured up in their heart of 
hearts, as a sacred dream of the past, forgetful of all his 
faults and shortcomings, only remembering his virtues. 

Victorine shrunk as if he had been an actual ghost— she 
quivered all over with nervous excitement, putting out her 
hands as if she would ward off some spectral visitant. 

“ Papa!” she gasped out, terrified at the stifled sound of 
her own voice, “ papa!” 

The stranger had lifted one long, slender forefinger, with a 


110 


LOTTIE AND VICTOR INE. 


quick, warning gesture which brought back the days of her 
girlhood like a vivid dream. 

“ Hush, child!” he said, in a low, impressive voice; “ let 
us have no scenes. Is it Lottie or little Victorine?” 

“ Victorine, papa!” she answered, still trembling excess- 
ively. 

“ Kiss me, Victorine.” 

He pressed his lips to hers, as she strove to steady her tot- 
tering limbs by grasping at a tall. Gothic-backed chair. 

“ Sit down, Victorine,” he said, drawing forward another 
chair, and patronizingly motioning her to a seat. “ Good 
heavens! that I should be the father of such a tall creature as 
that!” 

“Oh, papa, papa,” gasped Victorine, “we thought you 
were dead!” 

“1 know, I know!” said Mr. Avenel. “Calm yourself, 
my dear, and I will explain matters. 1 hope you’re not go- 
ing to faint.” 

“ No,” said Victorine, commanding herself with a great 
effort. 

“ I'm glad of that,” said Mr. Avenel. “ I hate fainting 
fits; I detest scenes of any nature whatsoe\er. You’re all 
right, eh? Now, I’ll tell you all about it. I did play you a 
little trick about drowning myself at Montmorenci Falis. 1 
confess that; but I really couldn’t help myself. I was fet- 
tered hand and foot, you see, and either to die or to make be- 
lieve to die was the only resource left open to me. Don’t 
shrink back, my dear; all this was through no fault of mine. 
I had endured for others, and became the irresponsible sufferer 
for their knaveries. Could I allow the shadow of disgrace to 
rest on my daughters’ names? Could I let my mad folly be 
visited on their harmless heads?” 

And Mr. Avenel looked the picture of injured innocence and 
paternal self-sacrifice. 

“ At first I did intend to make away with myself,” he went 
on, “but then 1 reflected that I might possibly tide over the 
ruin with a little judicious management and keeping close. I 
knew — or at least I supposed— that you would have a good 
home with your aunt. I went abroad and did the best I 
could, always intending to return and claim my darlings as 
soon as the wheel of fortune took a lucky turn, but it never 
did until within the year. Now I can pronounce myself to be 
pretty tolerably well off. But when 1 came to look for you, 
there was no trace to be found. Joanna had gone West and 
died, and I was just deciding to set off in search of you when 


LOTTIE AND VICTOEINE. Ill 

— exactly like a scene in a theater — you walk in upon me and 
know me in a second. And where's Lottie?" 

“ Lottie is in a telegraph office, papa, up in New Hamp- 
shire." 

“ In a telegraph office. My daughter working for her liv- 
ing!" echoed Mr. Avenel, straightening himself up, so that 
the light glittered from his superb diamond shirt-studs, and 
made a circlet of yellow fire in the immense topaz ring that 
he wore on his little finger. 

“ What else could we do, papa?" said Victorine, a little 
reproachfully. “ Starve? Or live on the grudgingly allowed 
charity of others? Perhaps, then, you are not aware that I 
am the maid of one of the young lady guests at present stop- 
ping at Charlesworth — Miss Sara Fordham." 

“ You, Victorine? A — maid?" 

“ Precisely that, papa. And very thankful for an oppor- 
tunity to earn a decent living. Miss Fordham has been very 
kind to me, and treats me more like a companion than any- 
thing else; but, all the same, I am her paid servant." 

Mr. Avenel twisted the big topaz uneasily around on his 
finger. 

“ An awkward social complication," said he. “ Well, well, 
we must set it all right again. I J ve made some lucky hits of 
late in the foreign money market, and we'll start the world 
anew— you and I and little Lottie. 1 hope she isn't as tall as 
you, eh? It makes a man feel so elderly to be the father of 
two young giantesses." 

“ I don't know, papa," said Victorine, sadly. “ I haven't 
seen Lottie in four years. She was educated at Mount Saco, 
and went from there directly to her present situation in the 
White Mountains." 

“ Well, I dare say it will all be right. But how curious that 
you and I should happen t<f be staying at the same house, 
neither of us aware of the other's propinquity." 

Victorine smiled. 

“ 1 did not suppose that the name of Miss Fordham's maid 
was of sufficient importance to be registered in the visitors' 
book," said she. 

“ My dear girl," said her father, “ will you oblige me by 
leaving off talking about your peculiar relations to this Miss 
Fordham, whosoever she may be? Did I not tell you we were 
going to begin the world again?" 

“ But, papa, Mr. St. Charles did not mention your name as 
one of his guests. He only spoke of a Mr. ChurchJeigh. At 
least, so Mrs. Fordham told me." 


112 



LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. . 

“ Avenel Churehleigh, my dear, afe your service,” said her 
father, with an inclination of the head. “ I had a little be- 
quest from a distant relative, last year — in fact, the very be- 
quest that made the turning point of my fortunes. Ilis name 
was Churehleigh. I took the name of Churehleigh out of 
compliment to my benefactor, as 1 couldn’t do anything else 
for him. Besides, I think Churehleigh a more distingue 
name than Ayenel, don’t you?” 

Victorine looked at her father in some surprise. Brought 
up as she had been, to look gravely and soberly upon life, she 
could scarcely comprehend the light frothiness of the super- 
ficial nature which treated the problems and obligations of ex- 
istence so lightly. 

“Hush!” said Mr. Avenel Churehleigh, as we must now 
call him; “ isn’t that the dinner-bell? Seven o’clock,” re- 
ferring to a huge gold chronometer, whose chain hung across 
his spotless white waistcoat. “ Dear, dear, how time flies in 
these little domestic confidences. I hadn’t the slightest idea 
it was so late. Come, my love.” 

And he offered her his arm with the grace of a Lord Ches- 
terfield. 

“ Where, papa?” 

“ To dinner, of course.” 

Victorine drew back. 

“ No, papa. 1 prefer to take my meals in my own room,” 
faltered she. 

“ And I prefer that you should not,” said Mr. Churehleigh, 
with an air of quiet resolve. “ It is proper and fitting that 
my daughter should assert her social ^ position at once. 
Come.” 

* And, although her heart throbbed with suffocating rapidity, 
and the color fluttered nervously on her cheek, Victorine 
found herself compelled to obey. 

“ Your dress is as yet hardly what I should like it to be,” 
said Mr. Avenel Churehleigh, with a disparaging glance at 
Victorine’s plain blue muslin; “ but it at least possesses the 
merit of simplicity, and that in itself is sufficient. Don’t 
tremble so, my dear,” with a reassuring pressure of the hand. 
“ What are you afraid of?” 

“ Of everything and everybody,” Victorine might have an- 
swered — but she kept quiet, wondering within herself what 
Sara Fordham would say to the unexpected turn that events 
had taken within the last two hours. 

She glanced up timidly at her comj>anion as she walked 
along, with an unacknowledged respect for the perfect non- 


— — — — , — — 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 113 

chalance, the cool scivoir fairs which enveloped him, as it 
were, in a complete armor of confidence. Why could not she 
meet the world on such terms as that? And she could but 
confess to herself that he was a companion for any one to be 
proud of. Rather slender, with a handsome, high-bred face, 
whose beauty was only slightly detracted from by the height 
and narrowness of the brow; hair and mustache of the same 
glossy black which she had always remembered; dress perfect, 
and calm, languid manner; he bore the imprint of “ gentle- 
man " all over him. 

“ A hundred times as distinguished looking as Squire Ford- 
ham," thought Victorine, with a thrill of filial pride. 

The dining-room at Charlesworth was in keeping with the 
rest of the house— -a large, long room, with flower-filled Span- 
ish courts on all three sides, looking as if it were an inclosed 
bit of garden itself, and divided from these courts by slender 
pillars of variegated marble, with Ionic capitals and draperies 
of deep-blue silk, which were drawn in graceful festoons to 
the very top, so that the light, and sunshine, and fresh air of 
the summer evening should have an undisturbed current 
through the apartment. It was a strange, beautiful place, 
with tropic vines swinging to and fro, huge palm leaves flut- 
tering in the breeze, and birds singing, as if their silver notes 
would fain drown the musical dripping of the fountain. Here 
and there a marble statue gleamed through the wilderness of 
flowers and foliage, like some beautiful nymph or fawn 
stricken by an enchanter's wand into eternal silence. 

Close to the doors communicating with the drawing-room, 
which had just been opened, stood Mr. Dowerson, tall, polite,' 
and Sir Charles, Grandisonian as ever. 

“ 1 beg your pardon, sir," said he. “ I have just sent 
James to the library for you." 

“All right, Dowerson— I'm here," said Mr. Churchleigh, 
with a patronizing nod. “ Your master in the drawing- 
room?" 

‘^Yes, sir." 

And Victorine, with her heart throbbing faster than ever, 
found herself led into the very presence of the assembled 
guests, who were just rising to file into the dining-room. 

Squire Fordham stared. Mrs. Fordham uttered a little 
croaking sound of astonishment which no combination of 
words could do justice to. Sara drew herself up in haughty 
displeasure as she saw Victorine Avenel leaning on the arm of 
the slender, aristocratic-looking stranger. 

Oliver St. Charles saw at a glance that something new and 




114 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


unexpected had transpired, and with the quick instinct of one 
well versed in social machinery, he stepped forward and quiet- 
ly introduced Mr. Churchleigh to the Fordham family, and 
half a dozen others who were assembled there for dinner. 

Mr. Churchleigh bowed with the air of a grand rajah con- 
ferring an inestimable favor on his subjects. 

“And now.” said he, “/ have a little introduction to 
make. St. Charles, allow me to present you to my daughter. 
Ladies and gentlemen, I have great pleasure in making you 
acquainted with my daughter, Miss Avenel Churchleigh.” 

And so Mr. Churchleigh, with a calm confidence which can 
not be too highly commended, took the citadel of society by 
storm. 

“You’re all very much surprised, and a little inclined to 
be doubtful,” said Mr. Avenel Churchleigh, looking around 
with that amused, superior smile of his. “ 1 can see it in 
your faces. But if you’ll begin to eat } r our dinner with a 
good appetite. I’ll explain the whole thing. It’s quite one of 
those romances in real life that one is always reading about.” 

And with infinite lonhommie and humor, not unmingled 
with a little pathos, Mr. Avenel Churchleigh told the little 
drama of Montmorenci Falls, and its sequel, making himself 
into a sort of unconscious hero who had surmounted all life’s 
difficulties and brought home the laurel wreath of victory to 
lay it at the feet of his beloved children. He was the hero, 
and, in a secondary way, Victorine, who sat, coloring and em- 
barrassed, with her eyes fixed intently on her plate, was a 
heroine. The guests -were a little puzzled at first, but Mr. 
Churchleigh’s persuasive eloquence and Victorine’s loveliness 
would have reconciled much more conflicting elements of 
doubt and discrepancy; and before the meal was concluded, 
the healths of the “ restored heiress ” and her father were 
drunk with the utmost enthusiasm. 

“ Didn’t I always tell you our Yic was a lady?” whispered 
Frank to his sister. Sara did not reply — she was not exactly 
pleased with the unexpected cours$ of affairs. 1 1 did not suit 
her that Victorine Avenel should be promoted into perfect and 
recognized equality with herself. Miss Fordham, of Fordham 
Manor. But she could not but perceive the manifest expedi- 
ency of acquiescing, with at least seeming heartiness, in what 
she could not help— and so, after dinner, she went up to Vic- 
torine, took both her hands in hers, with an affectionate little 
squeeze, and kissed her. 

“ I'm so glad, dear!” said she. “ It’s just like a novel, 
isn’t it? But of course I shall lose my maid.” 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


115 


“ Papa says so,” said Victorine, with downcast eyes. 

“ I assure you, Miss Fordham, that I must have her all to 
myself, after all these years of separation,” said Mr. Church- 
leigh, graciously joining the group. “ But if you will be so 
very good as to assist her with your advice and judgment 
about a new wardrobe, 1 can not tell you what obligations you 
will lay me under. Of course she’s very charming and all 
that in this Cinderella sort of costume,” playfully tapping 
the blue muslin shoulder of his daughter, “ but now that the 
fairy godmother has come, and the pumpkin turned into a 
gold-mounted coach, I want her to model a little more after 
your style.” 

Sara smiled and colored at the implied compliment. She 
liked to go shopping, and rather relished the idea of patron- 
izing Victorine yet a little while longer, under one pretense or 
another, and she assented with alacrity. 

And so Mr. Churchleigh wrote a check at once — a check for 
five hundred dollars, which seemed almost a fabulous sum in 
Victorine ’s eyes — and gave it to her. 

“ Make yourself charming as expeditiously as you conveni- 
ently can, my dear,” said he, “ and then we’ll go after that 
other Babe in the Woods of mine, up in the White Mount- 
ains.” 

How strange it seemed to Victorine, who never had had 
more than five dollars at a time to spend on herself in the 
whole course of her life, to be driving about New Haven in 
the Charlesworth carriage from store to store, throwing away 
money, as it seemed, on silks and muslins, French hats, pearl- 
sticked fans, and lace parasols, to say nothing of boxes of 
gloves, cobweb handkerchiefs, and a thousand expensive 
knickknacks, which Sara insisted on as positively indispensa- 
ble. Strange, but infinitely delightful. 

Twice she sat down in the evening, when she had succeeded 
in gaining the quiet and seclusion of her own room, to write 
to Lottie, and twice she abandoned the attempt. 

“ I can’t write it all as it really happened,” she said aloud 
to herself. “I must wait until I can see her face to face. 
Oh, Lottie! my dear, darling Lottie! the best part of it all is 
seeing you /” 


CHAPTER XXII. 

THE TWO SIST E R S . 

The Folliott Mountain House was in the full flood-tide of its 
prosperity during these long, bright days in later June. The 


116 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


increasing sultriness of the weather had driven people in a 
migratory flock from the surrounding cities into the cool heart 
of the grand, blue-crested old mountains, and the stately hotel 
at their foot, like all its surrounding brethren, was reaping a 
golden crop out of fashionable whims and caprices. 

The evening train had just steamed up opposite the broad 
plank walk which led to the capacious-verandas of the Folliott 
House. A swarm of guests in bright summer muslins, float- 
ing sashes, and irreproachable broadcloth, had come out to 
witness the semi-diurnal event of the arrival of the “ through 
express from Boston,” the band was playing merry music 
from Offenbach, and the glory of the coming sunset rested 
like an aureole on the sides of the superb heights which sloped 
up on every side like living walls. 

“ Tired, eh, my love?” questioned Mr. Avenel Church- 
leigh, as he walked up the broad foot-way, his daughter on 
one arm and a pile of traveling-shawls on the other. 

“ A little, papa,” confessed Victorine, who had been trav- 
eling since early morning. “ But 1 don't mind that, now we 
are so close to Lottie.” 

She glanced nervously into the little glass inclosure over 
whose top was blazoned in huge gilt letters the legend, 
“ Telegraph Office,” but a tall, spare, middle-aged man 
reading the newspaper was its only occupant. She shrunk 
back with a little pang of disappointment. 

“ Papa! she isn’t there.” 

“ She's somewhere about the place, I dare say,” said Mr. 
Churchleigh, advancing to register his name in the Visitors' 
Book, and claim the expensive suite of rooms for which, un- 
der his new name, he had telegraphed a day or two before. 
The clerks bowed obsequiously to a guest who could afford to 
engage such rooms as those — the black porter ran on before 
with alacrity, carrying the bags and shawls, and the superb 
silver dressing-case which Mr. Churchleigh generally con- 
trived to travel about with. 

The latter gentleman turned back, however, as he was on 
his way up the staircase. 

“ Is— is the young lady who officiates here as telegraph 
operator— Miss Avenel, I believe her name is— in, just at 
present?” he questioned. And Victorine, who had whispered 
to him to ask, stood with palpitating heart, awaiting the an- 
swer. 

“ Not just at present, sir,” said the clerk, with all due 
deference. “ Went for a little fresh air about half an hour 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 117 

ago, sir. She will soon be hi — she isn't often absent at this 
time of day." 

“ Oh, papa, can not I wait here?" pleaded Victorine. 

“ Wait here? No, certainly not. All dusty and travel- 
stained in the midst of this concourse of people!" was Mr. 
Churchleigh's grave and rather scandalized retort. “ I think, 
my dear, you are forgetting yourself. We will go upstairs, 
and refresh ourselves with baths and a complete change of 
clothing, while we are waiting for your sister." 

And Victorine, who was dutifully learning to merge her 
own will in that of her father, unwillingly followed him u]i- 
stairs, looking with wistful, inquiring eyes in the face of every 
lady she met, half hoping that each might be the beloved sis- 
ter she had not seen for so many years that she was fearful 
she should not recognize her when at last the joyful moment 
of meeting should arrive. 

“ But if Lottie were to laugh, I should know her at once," 
thought eager Victorine. 

Meanwhile, Lottie herself, coming in from the woods with 
that light, swinging gait which she herself was wont to call 
“ a part of her masculine independence," and her hat fan- 
tastically trimmed with ferns and young oak leaves, took pos- 
session of her sanctum with the greatest philosophy. 

“ I wandered a little further than I intended," said she. 
“ And I've almost run since I heard the sound of the train 
whistle. You’re not tired of waiting, are you, Mr. Leyden?" 

“ Not at all," said Mr. Leyden, who, being an old hand at 
telegraphy, frequently took Lottie Avenel's place in an emer- 
gency. “There’s been nothing doing since until the train 
came in. But we're likely to be pretty busy now." 

“ All right," said Lottie, flinging her fern-fringed hat into 
a corner, and taking her accustomed seat. “ And very much 
obliged to you, Mr. Leyden." 

“ Miss Avenel," called out one of the bell-boys, “ there's 
some fine folks waiting to see you upstairs. J ust come by the 
express. The same that telegraphed for Private Parlor Eight- 
een, with the two dressing-rooms and bedrooms." 

“ Let 'em wait," said Lottie. “ I must get through this 
press of work if the Prince of Wales and Her Majesty Queen 
Victoria were waiting upstairs." 

Five minutes afterward she thrust her pen scientifically 
behind her ear. 

“ Now, Joe," said she to the bell-boy, “ bring me the Visi- 
tors' Book." 

Joe obeyed. 


118 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“ Which are those people that inquired for me?” 

The grimy finger of the bell-boy traveled down the list and 
stopped at 

Mr. Churchleigh. ) New Haven C onn. 

Miss Churchleigh. f 

“ DoiTt know 'em from Adam/' said Lottie, knitting her 
pretty velvet-dark brows. “ Probably it's some mistake. 
Put back the book, Joe." 

But, about a quarter of an hour afterward, one of the serv- 
ants presented himself as the telegraph office. 

“ Beg parding for a-disturbin' of you, miss," with a rever- 
ent look at the clicking apparatus, which seemed, in his un- 
educated eyes, little short of a magical invention of the Evil 
One, “ but there's a hold gent and young lady up in the par- 
lors axin' for you, if so be you was come in." 

“ Any name?" said Lottie, indifferently. 

“ Name of Mr. and Miss Churchleigh, miss." 

“ Very well," said Lottie. “ I'll go up." 

And summoning Mr. Leyden to take her place, she walked 
deliberately upstairs, little dreaming whom she was to meet. 

* * * * * * * 

Mr. Avenel Churchleigh was sitting in a big easy-chair, 
close to the window, luxuriously enjoying the sunset. Vic- 
torine was walking up and down the room in a perfect fever 
of impatience. 

Lottie paused a second on the threshold, glancing around 
the room; then, as her eye fell upon Yictorine, she cried out: 

“ Vic! Darling Victorine!" 

And in a moment the long-separated sisters were folded in 
each other’s arms. 

“ How did you know me, Lottie?" questioned Victorine, 
between tears and laughter. 

“ Know you, dear? 1 would have known you if I had met 
you on the steppes of Siberia," said Lottie, with all her old 
energy. 

“ And you, Lottie, you're just the same," said Victorine, 
holding her sister off at arm's-length, to look at her more 
satisfactorily. “ Only you've grown, oh, so pretty! And — " 

“ Am I to have no share in this happy reunion?" asked 
Mr. Avenel Churchleigh, advancing with an ingratiatory smile. 

“ Papa!" cried out Lottie, just as Victorine had uttered the 
same word that night at Charlesworth — and a new series of 
explanations had to be gone over with, for the benefit of Mr. 
Avenel Churchleigh's eldest daughter. 


LOTTIE AtfD VICTORINE. 


119 


“ You surely can not be cruel enough to blame me, Lottie,” 
said Mr. Churcbleigh, taking Lottie's hand caressingly in his/ 
“ when it was all for your sake?” 

Lottie did not take away her hand, but she let it lie unre- 
sponsive in the cool, smooth palm of her father. 

“It is rather late in the day to talk about blaming you, 
sir,” said she. “ I might have blamed you in my heart once, 
and should have blamed you still more, probably, if I had 
known then, as 1 know now, that it was only a piece of melo- 
drama, that Montmorenci Falls business. But 1 don't see but 
that Victorine and I have got along pretty well, left to our 
own unassisted endeavors.” 

“ 1 hope, Lottie, my dear, you are not a satirist,” said Mr. 
Churchleigh, a little uneasily. 

“ I was not meaning to be satirical, papa,” said Lottie, 
simply. 

“ That's right, that's right,” said Mr. Churchleigh. 
“ Women should always preserve their feminine softness. 
People always are afraid of these witty females. However, 
that is scarcely to the point. I am glad you have grown up 
so pretty and stylish, my dear,” with an approving glance at 
Lottie's slight but beautifully molded figure, and lovely bru- 
nette face. “ Upon my word, I think I've reason to be proud 
of you and Yic. Go down-stairs, my dear, if you really are 
the telegraph operator here — ” 

“ 1 really am, papa,” said Lottie, laughing. 

“ And tell these people to look out for some one else at 
once,” added Mr. Churchleigh, in his most lordly style. 
“ Henceforth you must fill the station in life for which your 
birth destines you.” 

Lottie compressed her lips and knit her brows. 

“Mr. Leyden will take my place for this evening, I dare 
say,” said she. “ For the rest — I must take it into con- 
sideration. " 

“ My dear, are you crazy?” said Mr. Churchleigh. 

“Not that I know of, papa,” said Lottie, composedly. 

Mr. Churchleigh retired to his own room after tea. 

“I have some letters to write, and important papers to 
look over,” said he. “ And besides, although 1 would scarce- 
ly like to confess it to anyone but my own little girls, I'm 
not quite as young and elastic as I was twenty years ago, and 
naed repose after such a long day of travel as this has been, 

I dare say you girls will sit up and talk all night.” 

“ I dare say so, too, papa,” said Victorine, laughing. 




120 LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 

“Ah!” said Mr. Ohurchleigh, with a farewell gesture of 
chivalrous gallantry. “ what a thing it is to be eighteen!” 

“ Now, Lottie,” said Victorine, as soon as they were alone 
together in the luxurious little private parlor, whose windows 
commanded such a panoramic view of blue cliff and wooded 
slope, “ what did you mean by what you said to papa a little 
while ago?” 

“What I said to papa?” 

“Just before tea, you know— about wanting time for con- 
sideration about— about leaving this place?” 

“ Oh, yes,” said Lottie, “ 1 remember now. I did say I 
must take the subject into consideration, but 1 don't require 
any further consideration. I've made up my mind already.” 

“ And how?” Victorine leaned breathlessly forward, so that 
her lips almost touched her sister's cheek, her blue eyes gaz- 
ing intently into Lottie's darker orbs. 

“ Well, I'll tell you, Vic. Papa means well, 1 dare say. 
He wants to make a lady of me, but 1 don't want to be jnade 
a lady of. At least, not in his sense of the word.” 

“ Oh, Lottie!” 

“ How do I know,” went on Lottie, with a mischievous 
sparkle in her eyes, “ that papa may not take it into his head 
to die again? Then where should we be, I'd like to know? 
No, Vic — I am independent now, and independent I mean to 
remain. Don't cry, darling,” as Victorine, cruelly disap- 
pointed, burst into a shower of tears on her sister's shoulder. 
“You do perfectly right in accepting papa's protection and 
care; you were not situated as I am, and it is, perhaps, right 
and fitting that papa, in his old age” (how Mr. Avenel 
Ohurchleigh would have winced could he have heard these 
words— he, who prided himself upon the youthfulness of his 
appearance!) “ should be cheered by the companionship and 
affection of one, at least, of his daughters. But 1 would 
rather not be the one. Don't think me hard-hearted, dar- 
ling, but really, papa's whole life seems to me like such ‘a 
stupendous humbug that I can't trust him! I’m afraid 1 
shouldn't be dutiful enough to veil my real appreciation of 
his character. No, I will stay where I am, and work out my 
own destiny to suit myself. But, oh, Vic! I am so glad that 
you are happy. ” 

And not all Victorine Avenel's protestations, arguments, 
and entreaties could shake Lottie's steadfast resolution. 

“ I can support myself,” said she. “ Why should 1 be de- 
pendent upon Mr. Avenel Ohurchleigh, as he chooses to call 
himself?” 





LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 121 

44 But, Lottie, I had built so many air-castles — I had re- 
solved that vve should be so happy together.” 

“ So we will be happy, darling — one of these days, if not 
now. When you have a home of your own, or I have, per- 
haps.” 

Victorine colored a little — the deepening rose on her cheek 
did not escape Lottie’s keen eye. 

“ Tell me. Vie, have you fallen in love?” she demanded, 
prisoning her sister’s hands in both of her own. “ Who is 
lie? And are you quite sure he is worthy of my little Vic’s 
heart?” 

“Nonsense, Lottie,” said Victorine. 44 1 am not in love. 
There’s no 4 he,* at least not as yet.” 

44 But you’ll tell me when he does come?” pleaded Lottie, 
half suspicious still. ‘‘Truly, Vic, upon your word of 
honor?” 

44 Of course I will,” acceded Victorine. 

And the two sisters talked on until long past midnight; for 
they had much to say, after four years of separation. 

Mr. Avenel Churchleigh could scarcely believe the evidence 
of his own ears when, the next morning, Lottie repeated to 
him what she had told her sister the evening before — that she 
preferred earning her own living to placing herself once more 
under his charge, to become what he called a young lady of 
the very first fashion. 

44 My dear,” said he, incredulously, 44 1 think the air of the 
White Mountains must have been too stimulating for your 
brains. Think it over — think it over. I’ll give you a week 
for consideration.” 

44 Thank you, papa,” said Lottie, “but I don’t want a 
week. I fully intend to stay here.” 

And Mr. Avenel Churchleigh left the Folliott Mountain 
House that evening with only Victorine as his companion. 

44 Women are proverbially obstinate,” said he. “ But 
she’ll come to it in a few weeks, I don’t doubt. Good heav- 
ens!” as, leaning from the car window, he watched Lottie 
standing on the platform, waving her handkerchief to her sis- 
ter, “how beautiful she has grown! I thought Vic was 
pretty, but Lottie excels her as the royal rose towers over the 
pale little lily of the valley! Pity I couldn’t have talked Lot- 
tie over — she might have been very useful to me!” 


122 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


CHAPTER XX11I. 
love's young dream. 

Victorine Avenel had pleaded most earnestly with her 
father for permission to remain a little while longer with her 
sister at the Folliott Mountain House, but Mr. Churehleigh 
had most decidedly negatived the proposition. 

“ I promised St. Charles to return and spend the month of 
July with him," said Mr. Churehleigh, “ and 1 pride myself 
- on being a man of my word." 

“ But, papa, no one will ever miss me," argued poor Vic- 
torine. 

“ I beg your pardon, my dear," said Mr. Churehleigh, 
with the air of superior wisdom that always made Victorine 
feel very insignificant, indeed. “ St. Charles particularly re- 
quested that you would honor him, as well as myself. Of 
course I promised for you. Why, child, do you know that 
nineteen twentieths of the marriageable young ladies in Con- 
necticut would give their ears for an invitation to Charles- 
worth?" 

Victorine did not reply, but she colored in spite of herself, 
and felt a little uncomfortable. 

Why did her father lay that emphatic stress on the word 
marriageable ? If it only had not been for that, she would 
have been so proud and happy to think that Mr. St. Charles 
had thought it worth his while particularly to mention her in 
the invitation. 

“ I wonder," she asked herself, “if he remembers that 
night on the balcony, when he mistook me for Sara Ford- 
ham?" 

The father and daughter were warmly greeted when they 
returned to the Moorish Palace, on the shore of the blue 
river. A few questions and answers settled thS matter of 
Lottie's non-appearance. 

“ A willful girl will have her way," said Mr. Avenel 
Churehleigh, shaking his head with an aspect of the serenest 
good-humor. “ And if my little girl is happy with her friends 
up there, it would be little short of cruelty on my part to sepa- 
rate them." 

“ Oh!" said Mrs. Hartford, one of the guests, a lively lit- 
tle body, with dark, laughing eyes, “ then Miss Churehleigh 
is with friends?" 

“ No," Victorine. answered, lest a wrong inference should 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 1 23 

be drawn; “she is the telegraph operator at the Folliott 
Mountain House. ” 

Mr. Churchleigh allowed the matter'to pass with his usual 
complacent calmness, but when he was alone with his daugh- 
ter he burst forth angrily: 

“ Victorine, are you a fool? What under the sun is the 
use of proclaiming aloud to all these people that your sister is 
drudging away in a telegraph station to earn her own living?” 

“Is it anything to be ashamed of, papa?” said Victorine, 
with innocent bewilderment. 

“ Ashamed of? Hood heavens!” uttered Mr. Churchleigh, 
sinking back in his chair. “ 1 believe the girl is a born idiot. 
Now, don’t cry, don’t,” he said, as the tears were beginning 
to sparkle under Victorine’s long lashes. “ I didn’t intend 
to be cross with you; but, really, one would imagine that you 
might see the propriety of keeping these little family affairs 
to yourself. ” 

“ But, papa, Mrs. Hartford asked.” 

“ Well, couldn’t you have evaded the question? What was 
speech given to us for, as some clever fellow or other — I for- 
get his name — says, if not to conceal our real thoughts? My 
dear, you must learn a little more tact, if you expect to get 
on in the world.” 

And Mr. Churchleigh walked away, leaving Victorine still 
in doubt as to how she had actually offended. 

“ For it can’t be possible,” said frank Victorine to herself, 
“ that papa really wanted me to tell a lie about Lottie.” 

Meanwhile the days at Charlesworth passed blithely by, 
each characterized by some newer amusement or more agree- 
able method of whiling the time away. Guests came and 
went, but the house was always full. Squire Fordham and 
his wife returned to the Manor, but Sara and her brother were 
easily induced to prolong their stay indefinitely. 

“ This is something like life,” said Frank. “ Look here. 
Say, why can’t we have such doings as this at the stuffy old 
Manor? Couldn’t we get up something for Christmas? Pri- 
vate theatricals like that piece they had here last week — 4 Doc- 
tor Moonshine,’ wasn’t it? or something else, with lots of funny 
points in it.” 

“ We could, I suppose,” said Sara. 

“ Or a masquerade ball. A Dickens party, eh? You could 
be Edith Dombey, you know, and I’d be Sam Weller, in a 
regular English costume, with top boots and a striped shirt. 
And I say, what a beautiful Little Nell Victorine would 


124 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


make! Do you know, Say, I think St. Charles is a little — 
just a little bit, you know — spooney on Vic.” 

“ Nonsense !” cried Sara, tartly. “ What could possibly 
have put such a ridiculous idea into your head, Frank? And 
such odious language as you’ve picked up at Yale! Spooney , 
indeed!” 

“You don’t think there’s anything in it, then?” said 
Frank, with an air of great relief. 

“ Certainly not,” said Sara, with emphasis; and Frank, 
who had a vague idea that women knew more about such 
things than men, was satisfied with his sister’s decision. 

That self-same afternoon Mr. Avenel Churchleigh, coming 
down the broad staircase, met Victorine. She, too, was 
dressed for dinner, in a pale-blue silk dress, with a white 
blonde scarf looped lightly across her dress, and one or two 
odorous sprigs of heliotrope in her hair. 

“ My dear, you look very well,” said Mr. Churchleigh, 
scanning his daughter from tip to toe with that comprehensive 
glance which took in every detail in a second. 

“ Thank you, papa,” said Victorine, laughing and looking 
down. 

“ Do you care for a little turn in the court yonder, with so 
insignificant an individual as your father, when there are so 
many younger gallants sighing for the honor of your com- 
panionship?” gallantly questioned Mr. Churchleigh, as he 
drew his daughter’s arm under his. 

“ Oh, papa, you know I am always glad of an opportunity 
to be with you,” said Victorine, in all good faith. 

And Mr. Churchleigh, smiling and patting her hand, led 
her across the broad landing into one of those open quad- 
rangular courts, where a thicket of blossoming orange-trees 
made a cool, delicious semi-darkness, and at whose further 
end an artificial cascade tinkled down a fern-shaded grotto, 
while an aviary of robins, whose cage was hidden in vines and 
boughs, sung as piercingly as if they were in their own native 
wilds. 

place,” said Mr. Churchleigh, looking 

loveliest place in the world,” Victorine 
responded, enthusiastically. “ I never dreamed before I came 
here that anything could be made half so beautiful.” 

“It is money that is the magician’s wand,” said Mr. 
Churchleigh. “ Money is a great thing, Victorine. In short, 
money is the great end and aim of life.” 

“ Do you think so, papa?” asked Victorine, doubtfully. 


“ This is a pretty 
approvingly around. 

“ I think it is the 


LOTTIE AND V1CTOKINE. 


125 


“ My child, I know it. 1 might once have realized the 
dreams of Pactolus, but 1 was a romantic young fool, as so 
many others have been before me. 1 married your poor moth- 
er for love, instead of making a wealthy alliance, and that 
was the end of my career. It’s a great thing to marry rich.” 

“ Yes, papa,” said Victorine, submissively. 

“ I suppose you wonder why I’m saying all this to you?” 
said Mr. Churchleigh, turning quickly toward her. 

“ A little, papa.” 

“Is it possible, my darling, that you have failed to per- 
ceive how much the young prince of all this fairy kingdom 
admires you?” asked her father, taking a long chestnut curl 
into his hand, and. caressing it as he spoke. 

Victorine’s face glowed into scarlet— the long lids drooped 
over her eyes. 

“ Me, papa!” she faltered. 

“ Ah, you may well blush and smile, my little girl. Yes, 
you.” 

“ Papa, you must have fancied it,” said Victorine, uncon- 
sciously tearing a spray of milk-white orange buds to pieces in 
her embarrassment. 

“ My dear, an old campaigner like myself is not so easily 
deceived,” returned Mr. Churchleigh, with a superior smile. 
“ St. Charles loves you. He will tell you so himself, ere 
long, or 1 will agree to forfeit my character as a prophet. 
Don’t tremble so, little one, like a caged linnet. There’s 
nothing so terrible in the idea, is there? Well, well, sit down 
and rest here, and the old father will go down to the bowling 
alley and take a turn with the balls before dinner, by way of 
getting up an appetite.” 

' So Victorine Avenel was left alone with the sweet, heavy 
scent of orange-blossoms, and the tinkle of the cascade falling 
over its mossy rocks — left alone with her own thoughts. 

Half frightened, half incredulous, yet wholly glad and 
thankful, she sat there, feeling as if some one had suddenly 
drawn away the veil that hid a sweet secret shrine. 

If only it were true! And then, with burning face and eyes 
averted — even from the questioning glances of the fluttering 
robins in their cage— she owned to herself that she did love 
Oliver St. Charles. 

Victorine Avenel had her own very definite ideas on sub- 
jects such as these— young girls generally have. And one 
of them was, that no girl of proper dignity and self-respect 
would allow her affections to stray away unsought. In her 
opinion, the maiden who fell in love without first having been 


126 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


asked for her heart, was unmaidenly and bold. But now — 
things looked so differently to her. Mr. St. Charles certainly 
had made no declaration of love — and yet Victorine felt that 
her little shy, fluttering heart had gone out of her possession 
into his. 

“ But he don’t know it,” said Victorine, looking intently 
at the silver-dripping fringe of the cascade. “ And he never, 
never shall know it, unless — ” 

“ Vic! Are you there? And all dressed for dinner 
already?” 

Victorine Avenel started up like a guilty thing. It was 
Sara Fordham, rustling into the court, her violet silk skirts 
trailing on the pavement, and a rather overstrong scent of 
patchouli following her presence. 

“ I am glad you’re here, Victorine,” said Sara, slipping 
into a seat beside her, and putting her arm around Victorine’s 
waist. “ 1 don’t often get a chance for a good long talk with 
you.” 

“ There are so many people staying here, and so few op- 
portunities,” pleaded Victorine, feeling a little conscience- 
stricken. 

“ Yes, I know,” said Sara. “ But I have something very 
particular to talk about.” 

“ What is it?” . 

“ Can’t you guess?” said Sara, laughing. “ But you never 
were a genius at guessing. I’ll tell you, Vic. I’ve just been 
out for a long walk with Mr. St. Charles.” 

“ Have you?” 

“ And I’ll tell you , Vic — mind, I wouldn’t tell any one else 
— I do believe he loves me.” 

Victorine listened silently, scarcely knowing what to say. 

“ Not that he told me so, in so many words — but he was 
talking of giving Charlesworth a mistress. 1 pretended not 
to understand, you see, and cried out, ‘ Oh, Mr. St. Charles, 
where can you ever find a woman worthy to be queen of these 
fair domains?’ And he looked at me with those big Spanish 
eyes of his, that seemed to melt and soften at every word ho 
spoke, and answered, quite slowly, as if he were weighing 
every sentence: 4 1 am not quite certain, Miss Sara, that the 
future mistress of Charlesworth is not even now a guest be- 
neath its roof. ’ ” 

“ What did you say?” 

“ What could I say? I do believe, Vic, he was on the verge 
of proposing, when just then that hateful little Mrs. Hartford 
came upon us out of one of those winding walks, with Harry 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 127 

Russell, and of course our tete-a-tete was at an end. But 1 
certainly think he meant something, don’t you, Vic?” 

“ 1 don’t know,” Victorine answered, confessing to herself 
that Mr. St. Charles’s speech was, perhaps, capable of an in- 
terpretation of which Sara Fordham never dreamed. 

Fortunately for Victorine, the dinner was announced at that 
moment, and she was saved from further cross-examination 
upon a subject so near her heart. 

She awoke the next morning feeling vaguely as if a new 
and beautiful world had dawned upon her— as if the sun shone 
more brightly, and the flowers bloomed with a newer and 
more sacred meaning. Ah, poor Victorine! she had already 
passed into the enchanted land of love. 

And, ak day after day went by, and Oliver St. Charles be- 
came more and more earnest and delicate in his attentions, 
Victorine forgot all the lessons of coldness and reserve she had 
hitherto taught herself, and smiled back to his smiles with the 
shy, bright happiness of one who believes herself to be beloved 
as truly as she loves. 

And Sara Fordham, firmly convinced that she was elected 
to be the fortunate bride of the lord of this fair Moorish pal- 
ace, was already studying out the plan of her trousseau. 

“ I’ll write to Kate Osprey, in Paris, to order the wedding- 
dress there,” said she to her mother one day, when she had 
driven herself over to Fordham Manor in the little basket 
phaeton drawn by two Lilliputian ponies which Mr. St. 
Charles kept for the convenience of his lady guests. 

“ My dear , ’ ’ said the aghast matron, “ wouldn’t that be 
very premature? Because, you know, he hasn’t quite pro- 
posed yet.” 

“ Oh, I sha’n’t tell her it is for me.!” said Sara, laughipg. 
“ 1 shall ask her to order one for a friend of mine, just about 
my height and size. And 1 can send over the patterns at 
once, so that she can bring over the dress, free of duty, in 
September, when she comes.” 

From which remarks it will be perceived that Miss Ford- 
ham was very sure of her prey. 


CHAPTER XXIV. 

ROUSED FROM THE DREAM. 

“ Look, Vic, here’s a sample.” 

Sara Fordham had burst into Miss Avenel’s room like a 
whirlwind,' scarcely pausing even for the preliminary cere- 
mony of a knock. Victorine was sitting in the bay-window, 


128 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


at a little blue-draped writing-table— she made an unsuccess- 
ful essay to close her portfolio as she entered, but it was too 
late; Sara’s quick eye had already caught sight of her occu- 
_ pation. 

“Writing poetry! Vic, 1 never suspected you of that,” 
cried she, laughing. 

“ I was only copying out a little piece that 1 liked,” said 
Victorine, provoked to feel the blood mounting to her brow 
and cheek. 

“ What’s it about? Oh, you won’t show me?” as Victor- 
ine resolutely closed her portfolio. “ Well, n’importe; 1 can 
imagine. Vic, I’ve found out your secret.” 

Victorine glanced up guiltily. “ My secret! Sara, I can 
not understand what you mean.” 

“Yes, your secret. You’re in love.” 

“ Sara!” 

“ Don’t look so shocked and frightened, dear,” said Sara, 
laughing, and tapping her friend’s cheek. “ It’s not a state 
prison offense. I’m in love myself, am I not? But you shall 
confide in me.” 

“ Indeed, indeed, I have nothing to confide, Sara.” 

“ At least let me guess who it is,” said Miss Fordham, in 
great good-humor. “And I think I shall strike home at 
once. Is it our Frank?” 

“ Certainly it is not,” said Victorine, rising determinedly 
up. “ Neither Frank Fordham nor any one else.” 

“ Then it’s Harry Russell. To be sure, he’s rather plain 
looking, but — ” 

“ Sara, will you oblige me by changing the subject?” 

“ Of course, my dear, if you insist upon it. But never 
mind — I shall be sure to find it out, sooner or later, for I flat- 
ter myself I’m rather penetrating upon these subjects. How- 
ever, Vic, to return to what 1 was thinking about — here’s a 
sample of white silk. Plain rep, you see— dead color, with- 
out a bit of a pearl shade to it.* How do you like it?” 

Victorine looked critically at the glistening piece of silk, 
folded it crossways, rubbed it between her fingers, and picked 
out two or three threads from the filling. 

“ It looks like a beautiful piece,” said she. “ What is it 
for?” 

“ A wedding-dress. ” 

“ Whose?” 

Sara burst out laughing. 

“ Promise you’ll not tell a living soul, Vic. It’s for my- 
self,” said she. 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


129 


“ Sara. You are going to be married?” gasped Victorine. 

“ Some day I suppose I am,” 

“ And— and to whom?” 

“ Mind, you're not to tell. To Mr. St. Charles.” 

The room seemed to swim around Victorine— a deadly hand 
seemed tugging at her heart-strings; she sunk rather than sat 
down upon a silken-cushioned divan which extended around 
the inside of the bay-window. 

“Has Mr. St. Charles asked you to be his wife?” she 
asked, in a tone that sounded strangely stifled and far off — 
but Sara Fordham was, fortunately, too much engrosesd in 
her own thoughts and ideas to notice her friend's varying color 
and unnatural voice. 

“ Why, not exactly,” confessed Sara. “ But I am so cer- 
tain, from what he has at different times said and looked, that 
I think there can be no harm in going on with my prepara- 
tions. There are so many things to be done, and one does so 
hate to be troubled with vexatious delays. Only think, cherie , 
wouldn’t it be charming if we were both to be married on the 
same day? And I am quite sure that Mr. St. Charles is 
only waiting for an opportunity to settle the question at 
once. ” 

Vic tor ine's cold lips relaxed into a smile — she breathed free- 
ly again. There was something so infinitely comical in the 
idea of Sara's preparing her trousseau before the momentous 
question had been asked. 

“ Don't you think you are going on a little too fast?” she 
asked. 

“ Where's the harm? No one knows but you — and I have 
such an excellent opportunity touring over all my silk dresses, 
duty free, from Paris. Mrs. Osprey returns in September, 
and — is that Phoebe Marchlands knocking at the door? How 
provoking! And I was going to ask your advice about the cor- 
sage and sleeves — though, to be sure. Worth's man will under- 
stand all that.” 

But Miss Marchlands' entrance, to beg a crochet pattern of 
Miss Avenel, cut short Sara's confidential communications 
about her wedding outfit, and Victorine was very glad of it. 

There was a long walk that afternoon to the Bridal Veil 
Falls, a beautiful water-fall about three miles from Charles- 
worth, through a shaded river road; and although ten or a 
dozen people constituted the expedition, it somehow chanced 
that Mr. St. Charles himself was at Victorine's side, much to 
the chagrin and evident disappointment of Miss Fordham, 
who had done all she could, without positive rudeness, to 


130 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


make old Dr. M archlands understand that his companionship 
was undesirable. But the old doctor walked so close to her 
side, and talked fossils and botany with such obstinate per- 
sistency, that she was forced to give up the attempt in de- 
spair. Mr. Churchleigh had been walking beside his daugh- 
ter, but he fell back with well-bred unconsciousness to help 
Mrs. Hartford gather wild roses for her two little girls, when 
he saw that Mr. St. Charles was coming his way. And, side 
by side, they walked along the lovely rustic lane, tree boughs 
arching overhead, and birds darting in and out of the foliage, 
while between the net- work of leaves the blue gleam of the 
river, flashed up like a glimpse of melted sapphire. 

“ This is one of the prettiest roads in the neighborhood,” 
said Mr. St. Charles, drifting on to an indifferent subject, as 
people will sometimes do when their hearts are full. 

“Yes,” said Victorine, quietly, “it is very wild and 
lonely.” 

“ I remember once being lost here as a child,” said St. 
Charles, lightly. “ 1 was always a little afraid of Charles- 
worth in those days; the rooms were so big and echoing, and 
the courts seemed perfectly interminable. I was much hap- 
pier in the little foreign lodgings, when my father took me 
abroad, with old Euselia, the nurse.” 

“ Afraid of Charles worth!” said Victorine, innocently. 
“ I don’t know how any one could possibly be afraid here. * I 
should not, I know. ” 

He looked quickly at her. 

“You like it, then? You would be happy here? Miss 
Avenel, if I believed that—” 

“ Oh, Mr. St. Charles, take care. You are walking so near 
the edge of the river cliff. ” 

It was the shrill, high voice of Miss Marchlands, who had 
been walking rapidly to overtake them, and was completely 
out of breath. 

St. Charles bit his lip. 

“ There is no danger,” he said, quietly. “I know every 
inch of the road. Can I not carry that sheaf of ferns and wild 
flowers for you. Miss Marchlands*? You look tired.” 

“ If you would be so kind,” said Miss Marchlands. 

And Mr. Churchleigh, seeing from the vanguard that the 
party had increased to three, wished Miss Marchlands in 
Jericho. 

# But enough had been said to set Victorinas heart throb- 
bing, her pulses circling with happy consciousness. His tone, 





LOTTIE AND VICTOIilNE. 131 

his look wore unmistakable, and in her own soul the girl com- 
pleted his half-finished sentence a dozen times. 

“He loves me! he loves me!” -she murmured to herself. 
“ Oh, what have 1 done, in what am I better than other girls, 
to deserve such happiness as this?” 

It was after sunset when they returned home, and after the 
state ceremonial of dinner, which daily event at Oharlesworth 
never occupied less than an hour and a half, Victorine went at 
once to her own room. Mr. Churchleigh was occupied in con- 
versation with an old friend from New Orleans, who had un- 
expectedly arrived during their afternoon absence, and she 
had no mind to join in any of the little drawing-room coteries 
which were scattered about — some devoted to music, some to 
cards, some to indolent enjoyment of the mild July moon- 
light and the song of distant whip-poor-wills on the river- 
shore. Her own thoughts were the happiest and most con- 
genial companionship she could wish for. 

So rapidly did the time pass away, absorbed in sweet, fleet- 
ing dreams, that she was surprised by the clock striking eleven. 
Starting up, she began to unclasp the bracelet from her arm, 
and take the long turquois pendants from her ears, prepara- 
tory to undressing, when, all of a sudden, she missed a slender 
golci chain from about her neck, a chain to which she gener- 
ally wore affixed an oval locket of dead gold. 

“ Oh, I remember,” she thought, speaking half aloud. 
“ I took it off in the library, to show Mrs. Hartford the lock 
of Lottie’s hair that was braided there, and I must have for- 
gotten it. I’ll run down and get it now — I dare say the lights 
are still burning there, and all is quiet. No one goes much 
to the library at night. ” 

Victorine was right in both her conjectures. All was still 
and quiet, save for distant voices and laughter in the draw- 
ing-room. Twin clusters of wax candles burned on the 
library-table in engraved silver standards, and there, half hid- 
den by a ponderous portfolio of proof engravings, she saw the 
gleam of her little gold chain. 

Catching it up, she was about to return to her own room as 
speedily as she had come, when the sound of her own name, 
spoken in distinct accents, caused her to pause. 

And then, for the first time, she perceived that the door 
was partially open into one of the little anterooms, where the 
guests were privileged to smoke, play cards, or amuse them- 
selves as they chose. As she stood still, uncertain whether or 
not she had been called, her father’s voice sounded once more 
on her ears. 


132 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“ You see, it is just as 1 told you, St. Charles— my little 
girl is hopelessly iu love with you. In. fact — why should I 
conceal it? — she has all but confessed as much to me! And I 
tell you frankly, she’ll break her heart if you decide to take 
this long journey to !New Orleans without proposing to her.” 

There was a second or two of silence, through which the 
sonorous tones of her father’s voice seemed to reverberate, as 
Victorine stood there, with cheeks on fire, with the bitterest 
mortification she had ever experienced. And then Oliver St. 
Charles answered, in slow and somewhat constrained accents: 

“lam highly honored by Miss Avenel’s preference, and — ” 

But Victorine paused to hear no more. With footsteps 
winged by nervous haste, she glided out of the library, across 
the softly carpeted corridor, and up the broad walnut stairs to 
her own room, and flung herself on the divan, her face buried 
in her hands, her limbs crouched together in an attitude of the 
intensest humiliation. Had she been struck down by the blow 
of some cruel club she could not have felt more hurt, more 
bruised, more stunned in brain and body; while, through all, 
the keen consciousness of an overpowering shame pierced her 
heart again and again, like the barbed points of envenomed 
arrows. 

Had Oliver St. Charles, then, been driven to make love to 
her through the representations of hdr father? Were the at- 
tentions she had prized so dearly given to her out of mere 
pity, as one might fling a bone to a starving dog? Did he 
suppose she would lower herself to accept a love given per- 
force? 

And a great sob heaved itself up from her overcharged 
heart, while the big, scalding tear-drops plashed down, one by 
one, on the rose-silk cushions, each one the bitterest she had 
ever shed. 

To be offered thus, like a drug in the market; to have 
the confession proclaimed gratuitously aloud, which should 
only have been won from herself after tender entreaties, ear- 
nest supplications. Victorine could have groveled in the dust 
as she thought of what she had overheard. 

Good-bye, sweet dreams of love and hope! good-bye, bright 
anticipations, happy fancies! They were all buried in one 
grave now — buried deep, deep down, past all resurrection. 

The clock in the turret struck one, and still Victorine lay 
there, crouched like a hare in its form, her face pale in the 
moonlight that streamed through the bay-window, her hands 
deadly cold. And silently she rose and crept to bed, but not 
to sleep. 




LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


133 


Not till the gray dawn peeped through the casement, and 
then only to fall into a sort of uneasy doze, broken by fre- 
quent starts and fevered dreams. 

Poor Victorine! 


CHAPTER XXV. 

REJECTED. 

Victorine Avenel awakened the next morning with that 
vague sense of something having happened which is one of the 
dreariest heritages of sorrow in its first freshness. But the 
vagueness did not last long. It all came back to her as poign- 
antly as ever — the sharp mortification, the bitter despair. 

“ But I have a part to play,” she said, aloud, as she sat up 
in bed and put back the tangled brown curls which had 
fallen all about her face — the poor face that was so pale, and 
stained with tears. “ It will not do for me to sit moaning 
here.” 

She arose and dressed herself with unusual care, half wish- 
ing for one of Sara Fordham’s gilded china rouge-pots, as she 
noted the dead pallor of her cheeks. Not a ribbon, nor a 
lace frill, nor a necklace but was put on with especial atten- 
tion. The arrow was still quivering in her heart, but, like the 
Spartan lad of old, Victorine Avenel resolved that she would 
die sooner .than betray its presence there to the gaping eyes of 
the curious world. 

She put on a pink cambric morning-dress, selecting it be- 
cause of the rosy reflection it might cast on her alabaster 
cheeks, fastened a loop of pink ribbon in her hair, and went 
down-stairs as light and quick as ever. Only as she passed 
the library door, a chill shudder came over her. No one who 
has ever suffered the agonies of a severe surgical operation 
cares to revisit the spot where it was performed. The old 
anguish comes back sharp and sudden as ever, with the blind 
association of door and window, wall-paper, carpet pattern, 
even the droop of a muslin curtain, or the flutter of a leaf 
against the window. We are creatures of association^- and 
Victorine shuddered as she came by the half-open door, where 
the smell of mignonette and sweet violets came floating forth, 
just as it had greeted her senses the night before. 

Oliver St. Charles himself was the first person she met as 
she entered the breakfast-room. He looked at her with ten- 
der solicitude. 

“You are pale this morning, Miss Avenel,” he said, 
“ You have not rested well.” 


134 


LOTTIE AND VICTOlUNE. 


“ 1 beg your pardon/’ said Victorine, quietly. 44 1 have 
rested very well, aud I am not more pale than usual. I hope 
I am not too late?” 

There was something in the hard incisiveness of her tones 
that jarred on his senses, he scarcely knew why. Sara Ford- 
ham, too, caught the unwonted sharpness of her voice, and 
looked quickly up. 

44 You have had bad news from Lottie?” she asked. 

44 1 have had nothing of the sort,” said Victorine, seating 
herself next to Mrs. Hartford. 44 And 1 really don’t see why 
1 should be such a special object of interest to every one this 
morning. A glass of iced milk, please, John, and a roll.” 

And Mr. St. Charles, seeing that it did not suit Miss Ave- 
nel to be noticed in any way just at that moment, consider- 
ately began talking about the news contained in the morning 
paper. 

She was hurrying back to her own room afterward, when 
Mr. St. Charles overtook her. 

44 1 hope 1 am not interrupting you. Miss Avenel?” he 
said. 

44 Not in the least,” Victorine answered, with quiet dignity. 

44 Then 1 shall not' intrude on your engagements if 1 ask 
permission to say a few words to you?” 

44 As many as you like,” answered Victorine, mentally 
bracing herself for whatever might occur. 

44 Shall we go into the little blue boudoir? It is seldom 
occupied at this hour in the morning. ” 

He raised the festoons of pale-blue velvet — she passed be- 
neath them, like a queen, and seated herself in a low easy- 
chair which was drawn up close to a little table of inlaid ivory 
and lapis lazuli. He followed, and stood before her, tall, 
stately, and handsome. In all her life Victorine Avenel had 
never admired him as she admired him now. 

44 Miss Avenel,” he said, in the slow, self-possessed manner 
which was his birthright, “you have, perhaps, guessed what 
1 am about to say?” 

Victorine drew herself haughtily up. 

44 What right have you to infer that, sir?” she asked. 

44 None whatever,” he answered, slightly biting his lip. 
44 It was merely a conjecture on my part. However, let it 
pass. Miss Avenel, 1 do not know that I can select any bet- 
ter form of words than the good old-fashioned way of telling 
you that I love you, and asking you frankly if you will be my 
wife!” 

He advanced a pace or two as he spoke, and held out his 


LOTTIE AKD VICTOMN'E. 


135 


hand with a pleading earnestness in his eyes that had very 
nearly softened Victorine's heart. But she remembered what 
she had overheard the night before, and steeled herself against 
everything. 

“ No, Mr. St. Charles,” she answered, “ I will not.” 

He looked at her as if he could scarcely believe his own 
ears. 

“ Miss Avenel!” 

“Mr. St. Charles,” she repeated, with a slightly mocking 
accent, “ it is strauge, is it not, that any woman could be so 
wild as to refuse your offer. But it is even so, you perceive. 
Have you anything more to say, or may I be excused?” 

A strong spasm of pain passed over the stately Spanish 
features of the rejected lover as he stood there. 

“ May I not ask the reason of this curt refusal?” he per- 
sisted. 

“I do hot know why you should,” Yictorine answered, 
coldly. “ You have asked me a plain question; I have given 
you a plain answer. Why should there be any more asking 
or answering between us?” 

“ Then your decision is irrevocable?” 

“ Entirely so, Mr. St. Charles.” 

This repulse was quite enough. St. Charles once more 
touched the yielding spring that drew up the blue velvet dra- 
peries, and bowed with cold courtesy as he passed through. 

And Victorine Avenel felt that she was revenged. 

Mr. Churchleigh was walking up and down in the orange- 
tree court, smoking, as the gentleman whom he had so fondly 
hoped to call his son-in-law entered from the opposite door. 

“ My dear boy,” he said, extending his hand, “ how kind 
of you to allow me to be the first to offer my congratula- 
tions!” 

“ No congratulations are needed,” said Mr. St. Charles, 
coldly. 

“ I don't understand you.” 

“ It is easily explained. Miss Avenel has refused me.” 

Mr. Churclileigh's outstretched arm fell to his side— his 
lower jaw dropped. 

“ Kef used you! St. Charles, you certainly must be mis- 
taken,” he- cried. 

“ On the contrary. Miss Avenel took especial pains, by the 
distinctness of her terms, to avoid the possibility of a mistake 
of any nature. ” 

“ I'll see her at once,” cried out Mr. Churchleigh, Hinging 


136 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


his cigar out upon the lawn. “ FJ1 make her comprehend 
her duty as a daughter, her common sense as a woman . V 

But St. Charles gravely interposed. 

“ May I beg you not to interfere, Mr. Churchleigh?” said 
he. “It is to be presumed that Miss Avenel knows her own 
mind, and I should be the last to wish any force to be put 
upon her inclinations in favor of myself or any one else.” 

And he left the court. 

But Mr. Avenel Churchleigh was not thus lightly to be 
thrown off the track. Ringing the bell, he asked a servant 
to inquire if Miss Avenel was in her own room. 

“ And if she is, ask her if she will be kind enough to give 
me a few minutes’ audience,” he added. 

The servant was gone but a brief space of time. 

“ Miss Avenel was in her own room,” he said, 44 but would 
not trouble her father to come to her. She would wait upon 
him presently in the orange court.” 

And close upon the words of her own message, Yictorine 
entered the room, an unusual flush on her cheek, her eyes 
shining with restless excitement, but lovely as a pictured peri. 

“You wished to see me, papa,” she said, seating herself 
indifferently in one of the low rustic chairs. “ Here 1 am.” 

4 1 Yictorine,” demanded Mr. Churchleigh, plunging, with- 
out any circumlocutory phrases, into the subject, “is it true 
that you have actually refused Oliver St. Charles?” 

“It is quite true, papa,” Yictorine answered, with some- 
thing of defiance in her tone. “ Has he been making his com- 
plaints to you?” 

“ He has made no complaints. 1 asked him, and he told 
me the truth. Yictorine, what possessed you to fling away 
such a chance as this?” 

“ Simply a woman’s whim, papa.” 

“You can not help loving him. No woman could resist 
Oliver St. Charles. ” 

Victorine smiled satirically. 

“You see before you, papa, the identical woman who 
did.” 

“ l would like to know,” went on Mr. Churchleigh, getting 
more and more excited, 44 what you expect, Yictorine? To 
be an empress or a queen? Let me tell you, young woman, 
chances like this do not occur oftener than once in a life- 
time.” 

“ 1 think it very possible, papa.” 

44 Shall I send for St. Charles and tell him you have recon- 


u 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 137 

sidered the matter?” said Mr. Churchleigh, with a gleam of 
hope in his voice and manner. 

“ Certainly not. I have not reconsidered the matter, nor 
do I intend to do so,” said Yictorine, calmly. 44 I have given 
him my decision, and he will have the wisdom to abide by it, 
unless he wishes a further repulse.” 

44 Yictorine,” exclaimed Mr. Churchleigh, the purple blood 
mounting into his face and his teeth grinding together, 44 you 
shall marry St. Charles.” 

44 Papa, I will not.” 

44 Then you are no daughter of mine. I wash my hands, 
now and forever, of one who pays so little heed to my wishes, 
to say nothing of her own future welfare.” 

44 It shall be as you please, sir.” 

And Yictorine rose, walking quietly under the scented, 
overhanging boughs of the orange-trees, and left the room.’ 

44 Vic!” 

She started nervously as she found herself face to face with 
Frank Fordham, just outside the door. 

“ Don’t be frightened, Vic,” he said, hurriedly. 44 I — I 
couldn’t help hearing. I didn’t mean to be an eavesdropper, 
you know— but — but I heard it all. How you had refused 
St. Charles, you know, and — and— Vic, you’re a trump. 1 
always thought you one, but I know it now.” 

“ Frank, please let me pass,” said she, striving to slip by 
him. 

44 Not just yet, Vic. You’re not afraid of me, are you?” 

“ Afraid!” 

44 1 don’t mean that, Vic. I don’t know just what I do 
mean,” said Frank, with a little embarrassed laugh, 44 except 
that I love you better than anything else in the world, and if 
you won’t marry me I’ll cut my throat. ” 

4 4 Frank, are you mad?” cried out Victorine, breathlessly. 

44 1 know I’ve teased and tormented you all your life, but 
for all that I do love you, sweetest!” persisted Frank, whose 
impetuous wooing seemed as if it would carry all before it like 
a whirlwind. 44 And if you’ll only say yes , you shall never, 
never have occasion to regret it. I’m a rough sort of a fel- 
low, but you can do what you like with me, love. Say yes, 
only say yes! Say it’s for love of me you have refused St. 
Charles— for I firmly believe it is. Oh, Victorine, my little 
blue-eyed love— my darling!” 

And he threw his arms passionately about her. 

44 Frank, I think you must have taken leave of your senses!” 







' \ ' 








138 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


cried out Victorine, wresting herself from his embrace, half 
laughing, half indignant. 

Frank's countenance fell. 

“ Vic, don't you love me?" 

4% No, I don't. And I never did, and never will. JVoiv , 

are you satisfied?" 

And she hurried away, with crimsoned cheeks and eyes 
humid with unshed tears of bitter mortification. 

Poor Frank! His ill-sped suit had formed such a comical 
sort of parody on that of the master of Charleswortb. and was 
so markedly out of place, that she could hardly help smiling, 
sore and tortured though her heart was. How the barometer 
of Mr. Fordham’s self-esteem would have fallen, could he 
have known how little thought she gave to him and his blighted 
declaration of love. 

“Of course, after what has happened this morning," she 
thought, sitting with her round chin in her hands, her elbows 
on the velvet- covered writing-table in her room, while she 
looked out with unseeing eyes over the beautiful woods of 
Charlesworth Glen, in the valley below, “ I can not stay here. 
If poor Frank had not made such a fool of himself, I might 
have gone there. I think Mrs. Fordham would not have re- 
fused to take me in, although I am in disgrace. But that's 
out of the question now. Shall I go to Lottie?" 

Her heart gave a big sob of joy at the prospect of once more 
'throwing herself into the arms of her beloved sister — but then 
came sober second thoughts. What right had she to burden 
her struggling sister with her maintenance? 

“ No," she murmured; “ I must support myself — but how? 
And whither shall I go?" 

As these troubled meditations were chasing each other 
through her brain, a knock came to the door, and little Lucy 
Hartford, a chubby child of seven, stood smiling there, as she 
opened it. 

“ Here is your ivory crochet needle, Miss Avenel," said she, 
lifting up her rosebud of a mouth for a kiss. “ And mam- 
ma is much obliged." 

“ Doesn't your mamma wish to use it any longer, Lucy?" 
Victorine asked, as she kissed the little one. 

“ Oh, no. Mamma is packing to go back to New York 
this afternoon. We're all to start in the one-o'clock train." 

A sudden idea flashed into Victorine's mind. 

“ Lucy," said she, “ I'll go back with you." 

Mrs. Hartford's pretty suite of rooms was all in confusion 
—dresses piled on the bed, books lying about, and bureau 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 




139 

drawers wide open, while she herself, in a light foulard silk 
wrapper, knelt on the floor, in front of a colossal Saratoga 
trunk. She burst out laughing as Yictorine tapped on the 
half-open door. 

“ Chaos and old Night!” cried she; 44 but you haven't an 
idea, Miss Avenel, what it is to pack for yourself and two 
children.” 

44 I won't detain you, Mrs. Hartford,” said Yictorine, a lit- 
tle palpitating lump rising up in her throat as she spoke, 
44 but — may 1 go with you?” 

4 4 Go with me? Where?” 

Mrs. Hartford dropped a box of ribbons into the trunk and 
rose up, looking considerably bewildered. 

44 To New York.” 

44 My dear child, what for?” said Mrs. Hartford, opening 
her eyes wider and wider. 

44 To look out for a situation of some sort,” Yictorine 
valiantly answered. 

44 A situation! You? The betrothed bride of Mr. St. 
Charles, the richest man in the state?” 

Yictorine turned scarlet. How had this impression gained 
ground among all around her? AVho had taken pains to cir- 
culate the intelligence? She never once suspected, her father. 

44 1 am not betrothed to Mr. St. Charles,” she answered, 
speaking as steadily as she could. 

44 Not betrothed to him? My dear, I know it's horribly 
rude of me to keep on echoing your words in this maudlin 
sort of manner, but you do astonish me so! Are you really 
in earnest in what you are saying, or is this only a pretty, 
maidenly way of striving to conceal what all the world must 
soon know?” 

44 1 never was more in earnest in my life; Mrs. Hartford, I 
have refused Mr. St. Charles. Pray, pray do not ask me any 
more questions. ” 

Mrs. Hartford drew a long sigh of puzzled surprise. 

44 1 will ask you no questions, since you insist upon it, my 
love,” said she, 44 but 1 can not imagine what could possibly 
induce you or any girl to refuse such a prince among men as 
Oliver St. Charles. If he were a beggar he would be per- 
fectly irresistible, with that face and figure of his; but with 
all this into the bargain,” and she glanced round upon the 
stately apartment, and out at the terraced slope of gardens 
and lawns beyond, 44 he is a suitor such as seldom lays his 
heart at a gild's feet. Oh, my darling,” taking Yictorine's 


140 


LOTTIE AND VICTOMNE. 


hand caressingly within hers, “ think it over! Don’t decide 
too rashly!” 

Victorine averted her eyes. 

“ I have thought it over,” said she, “ 1 have decided. Be- 
lieve me, Mrs. Hartford, I can not go back from my word. 1 
must go somewhere, for papa is so angry with me that he has 
cast me off, now and forever. May 1 go with you?” 

“ But your friend Miss Fordham? My dear, a pretty child 
like you is better with her friends. I am a woman of the 
world, and have had more experience than you in these mat- 
ters,” said Mrs. Hartford, looking into Victorine’s face with 
an air of kindly protection. 

Victorine laughed a little hysterically. 

“ I can not go to the Manor, either,” she whispered, hiding 
her eyes on Mrs. Hartford’s shoulder. “ Frank must needs 
ask me to marry him this morning.” 

“ And you said no?” 

“ Of course I said no. Do you think that after 1 have had 
the love of Oliver St. Charles offered to me, I could marry 
Frank Fordham?” 

“ Frank is a nice sort of fellow, too,” said Mrs. Hartford; 
“ but altogether different from our host, I must confess. 
And so they have tormented you to death, my poor child, be- 
tween them.” 

“You will take me to New York with you, Mrs. Hart- 
ford?” pleaded Victorine, lifting her soft eyes imploringly to 
Mrs. Hartford’s pretty, matronly face. 

“ Of course I will, dear, and keep you as long as I can.” 

“ Not as your guest,” hurriedly interrupted Victorine. 
“ I can appreciate your hospitality, and I thank you for your 
gracious kindness; but — but I must earn my own living.” 

“ And how, little Miss Independence?” 

“ I don’t know how. I can’t tell. Perhaps you can advise 
me a little.” 

“ Perhaps I can,” said Mrs. Hartford. “ We’ll talk it 
over when we get to New York. But you must make haste 
with your packing, dear,” glancing at a small enameled 
watch that she wore at her belt, “ or you will be late. The 
carriage leaves the house at twelve, and it is now nearly 
eleven. ” 

“ 1 will be punctual,” said Victorine. “ I have not much 
packing to do. ” 

And when she joined Mrs. Hartford in her room, dressed 
in a quiet brown silk traveling suit, covered over with a linen 



I_L 1 — " 


— 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 141 

duster, all she carried in her hand was a small bag of Rus- 
sian leather studded with silver nails. 

“ Where are your trunks?” asked Mrs. Hartford, and to 
her great surprise Victorine answered: 

“ 1 have none. The wardrobe 1 wore here would be most 
unsuitable for a girl who has her own living to make. There's 
a change of linen in my bag, a few of the jewels papa gave 
me, and a little money — enough for my immediate wants. 
And I believe that is all I need. ” 

Mr. St. Charles, perhaps a little paler than usual, came 
down to the broad portico to bid his fair guest and her little 
girls good-bye, as the carriage that was to convey them to the 
train swept up to the front of the house. Victorine, who had 
entered it at the side door which led out from the library cor- 
ridor, shrunk back and pulled the sash down, for fear he 
should see her in her corner. 

“ Charlesworth will be very lonely without the prattle of 
my two little wives,” said Mr. St. Charles, smiling, as he 
lifted little Laura Hartford up on the step. “ I)o not let it 
be long before you return hither. Allen,” to the coach- 
man, “drive very carefully — the horses are a little timid of 
the trains.” 

“ Yes, sir,” said Allen, touching his velvet-banded hat. 

“ Mr. St. Charles, Mr. St. Charles!” piped out Lucy, the 
elder of the two girls, as the carriage rolled away, “ you 
haven't said good-bye to Miss — ” 

But her mother's hand, placed quickly over her lips, stifled 
the last word before it could be spoken. 

“ What is Lucy saying?” asked Mr. St. Charles — but the 
grinding of the wheels over the gravel deadened every sound, 
and the next minute they had whirled around a broad belt of 
white pine-trees, and were lost to sight. 

And Mrs. Hartford, looking at Victorine Avenel, saw that 
her face was as pale as death. 

“ What do you think?” cried Sara Fordham, as they met 
in the drawing-room, just before the dressing-bell sounded. 
“ Victorine Avenel has gone to New York with Mrs. Hart- 
ford. Wasn't it sudden? But Vic always was a strange, 
gypsy sort of a creature. She never told one of us, and. I 
shouldn't have known it at all if Mrs. Elmsley's maid, 
Louison, hadn't seen her get into the carriage at the library 
door, all dressed for traveling, with a satchel hi her hand.” 

Mr. St. Charles looked up suddenly, and his fingers uncon- 
sciously tightened on the edge of the mantel, against which 
he was leaning. But he said nothing. 


142 


LOTTIE ANT) VICTORINE. 


“ Gone to New York, eh?” said Mr. Churchleigh, smiling. 
“Just as you say, my clear Miss Fordham. Victorine is an 
impulsive sort of child. I’m never surprised at anything she 
chooses to do or say.” 

But within himself he muttered, savagely: 

“ Let her go! She’ll come back again fast enough when 
she learns what it is to want for bread and clothes. And 
then I’ll teach her what it is to set a father’s authority at de- 
fiance. Gone to New York, has she? I shall not follow her. 
Let her starve a little; it will do her good.” 


CHAPTER XXVI. 

MRS. HENNERY AND HER BUSINESS. 

“ Well, Victorine, and what next?” 

“I don’t know,” Victorine Avenel answered, smiling. 
For she could smile yet, although her heart was bruised and 
sore within her, and a great overwhelming sense of calamity 
followed her like a brooding shadow wherever she went. 

“ No, but really?” said Mrs. Hartford. “ Because I have 
somehow allowed myself to get interested in you, and I must 
honestly confess that I am as anxious as yourself. ” 

Victorine came closer to Mrs. Hartford and pressed her 
hand, with eyes brimming with diamond moisture. The 
word and look of sympathy had entirely broken down her lit- 
tle wall of assumed composure. 

“ Dear Mrs. Hartford,” she said, “ how shall 1 ever thank 
you for your kindness? But I have been thinking it all over, 
and it seems to me that the best way is to advertise.” 

Mrs. Hartford contracted her forehead in a puzzled way. 

“ To advertise for what?” 

“ Something to do.” 

“ My seamstress advertised last spring,” said Mrs. Hart- 
ford. “ She spent five dollars, and no one answered her poor 
little appeal.” 

“ No one at all?” 

“ No one at all.” 

“ But 1 can’t understand why,” said Victorine. “ This is 
an immense city, and people must want one’s services in some . 
capacity or other. ” 

“ 1 didn’t understand why. at first,” said Mrs. Hartford. 

“ But a little consideration made it clear enough to my mind.” 

, “ Then please make it clear to mine,” said Victorine. 

“ Don’t you see? There were so many seamstresses beg- 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


143 


ging for work at people's very elbows that nobody had any 
occasion to answer an advertisement." 

“ But," said Yictorine, after a few seconds of rather dis- 
comfited silence, “ I don't think that need necessarily hold 
good of other business." 

“ It will, in these hard times, you may depend on it," said 
Mrs. Hartford, shaking her head. 

Victorine lifted her eyes in innocent surprise. 

“ Are the times hard?" said she. “ I did not know it." 

“ My poor child, that is because you have been living among 
rich people," said Mrs. Hartford, compassionately. “You 
will find the social atmosphere very different, now, as well as 
the financial one." 

“But what am 1 to do?" said Victorine, beginning to bo 
seriously alarmed at the unpromising prospect before her. 

“ Now, listen to me," said Mrs. Hartford. “What were 
you intending to do?" 

“ I had not quite made up my mind," said Victorine. 
“ There are a good many things I could turn my hand to. 1 
have always made and fitted my own dresses. I can em- 
broider well. Monsieur Paghinello, Sara Fordbam's music- 
master, always said 1 played well and could teach others." 

“ Yes," said Mrs. Hartford, doubtfully, “ but there is such 
an immense competition in these ways of earning a livelihood, 
and they are paid at such starvation rates. Don't you think, 
dear, you had better return to your father, and tell Mr. St. 
Charles you have thought better of his offer?" 

“ Never!" 

“ Well — of course one must decide these matters for one's 
self," said Mrs. Hartford, smiling and shrugging her shoul- 
ders. “ But only think of the wide difference between Mrs. 
St. Charles, of Charlesworth, and a poor little working bee, 
such as you have elected to become." 

“ I know it," said Victorine, with a slight spasmodic motion 
of the muscles around her lips. “ Oh, I know it better than 
anyone can tell me! But please don't talk about it, dear. 
You can't understand. No one understands but myself." 

Little Lucy Hartford, who had been busy with her toy tea 
set in the corner of the room, now came up to her mother's 
side and looked wistfully up. 

“ Mamma," said she, in a stage whisper, “ what is Miss 
Avenel crying for?" 

“Never mind, my dear," said Mrs. Hartford. “Go and 
play. She has got the toothache. " 


141 


LOTTIE AND VICT01UNE. 


“ Peppermint is good for that,” said Lucy. “ Shajl I go 
get nurse’s bottle?” 

“Nonsense!” said Mrs. Hartford, half laughing. “Go 
and play, 1 say.” 

And Lucy obeyed, only partially satisfied. 

“ Well, what else were you thinking of?” went on Mrs. 
Hartford, when the small interlocutor was safe once more be- 
hind her china cups and saucers. 

“ 1 would take a situation as nurse — chamber-maid — seam- 
stress. I don’t care what, so that it insures me an honest liv- 
ing. Or I would stand behind a counter if any store-keeper 
would put up with my ignorance at first.” 

“ Right, my dear, right,” said Mrs. Hartford, nodding her 
head. “ I see you have thrown false pride to the winds. But 
now look here. There’s a little circulating library in Third 
Avenue, just around the corner ” (Mrs. Hartford’s house was 
on Lexington Avenue, near Grammercy Square), “ and I 
know the lady who keeps it — Mrs. Hennery. She has added 
a book and stationery department to it lately, and she needs 
an assistant. I went there for a book last evening, and she 
was talking about it. She can not pay very high wages, but 
still it will be better than nothing, until you hear of some- 
thing more lucrative.” 

“ Oh, Mrs. Hartford,” said Victorine, interlocking her fin- 
gers, with varying color, “do you think she would take me?” 

“I am sure she would, Victorine, on my recommendation. 
That will be five dollars a week at first; and then, if, at the 
end of a month, you still suit, it will be raised to seven. And, 
my dear, if you will take the trouble to give Lucy a few hints 
as to elementary music in the evenings, it will be an ample 
compensation for your board here. Don’t say a word as to 
thanks,” as Victorine endeavored to speak. “ I am a ‘ lone 
lorn ’ little widow, and your company will be a positive boon 
to me until you get tired of it. Is it a bargain? Then get 
your hat and we will go around to Mrs. Hennery’s and secure 
the place at once.” 

It was a tiny red-brick building, tucked in between one with 
an iron front and one of brown stone, as if a child had been 
building the street with different-sized blocks, and the front 
was nearly eclipsed with a gigantic sign, gilt-lettered, on a 
bright blue ground, “ Literary Emporium and Circulating 
Library,” while the new branch of the business was indicated 
by a small sign above, like a postscript on the wrong end of a 
letter, “ Books and Stationery.” 

Mrs. Hennery, a tall, stout woman, in faded black alpaca. 


LOTTIE AND VICTOllINE. 


145 


with a chocolate-colored * false front, with the parting very 
much on one side, and a black lace frill around the neck, that 
made her look like the engravings of Queen Elizabeth, was 
behind her counter chaffering with a little boy, who stood on 
tiptoe to see the gay . contents of the show-case, and had 
brought an order for one envelope and one sheet of paper. 

“ What color ?” said Mrs. Hennery, as she set chairs for 
Mrs. Hartford and her companion, “ Til not detain you a 
minute, ladies, but business is business. Blue, lavender, 
slate, or buff?” 

“ Dunno,” said the little boy, balancing his chin on the 
end of the counter, and rolling his eyes about. 

44 What is it for?” asked Mrs. Hennery. 

“ To write a letter,” said the boy. 44 For our Susy.” 

“ Is it*to her beau?” said Mrs. Hennery, with an insinuat- 
ing smile. 

“ Yes’m,” said the little boy, evidently thinking that Mrs. 
Hennery must have a magic wand of divination hidden away 
somewhere in one of the gilt-handled drawers. 

*‘Oh, well, then you want blue,” said Mrs. Hennery. 
“ Blue’s the color of love. Where’s your money?” 

The boy took a penny, wet and shining, from his mouth, 
and pushed it across the counter, making a slimy track like a 
snail. Mrs. Hennery picked it up with a bit of tissue paper. 

44 Where’s the rest?” said she. 

44 Ain’t got no rest,” answered the little boy. 

44 That isn’t enough, said Mrs. Hennery. “ A penny a 
sheet for the paper, and a penny for the envelope.” 

4 4 Gimme the paper, and I’ll go home for the other penny,” 
said the little boy. 

44 I’ll give you the envelope,” said Mrs. Hennery, “done 
up all neat and nice. And then you can come back for the 
paper.” 

44 Yes’m,” said the little boy, and away he went. 

Mrs. Hennery uttered a chuckle. 

44 If he’d taken the paper,” said she, “ they never in the 
world would have sent back for an envelope. Folks are so 
close. But the envelope won’t be a particle of use to ’em 
without a sheet of paper to put in it, so I’ll make my sale. 
Now, I’ll wager,” turning suddenly to Mrs. Hartford, 44 you’re 
wondering at my calculating so close about such a little 
thing?” 

Mrs. Hartford smiled. 

44 Well,” said she, 44 1 must confess that some such reflec- 
tion was passing in my mind.” 


140 LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 

“ You see, I have to do it in my business," said Mrs. Hen- 
nery. “ It's the little things that count up in the hash- 
drawer. My mother was a Scotch woman, with a proverb 
ready for every occasion, and one of 'em was: 

“ ‘ Many a little 
Make a mickle. ’ 

Dear me, dear me! how often I think of it. Now, Mrs. Hart- 
ford, how can I serve you?" 

“ You were speaking yesterday evening of securing the 
services of an assistant?" said Mrs. Hartford. 

“ Yes, I was," said Mrs. Hennery, suddenly becoming con- 
scious, from the mute testimony of an opposite mirror, that 
her front was “ off the plumb," and giving it a touch that 
sent it as far on the opposite side. 

“ Have you filled the vacancy yet?" 

“ No, ma'am, 1 haven’t." 

44 Allow me to introduce my friend Miss Avenel, who would 
be happy to become your assistant," said Mrs. Hartford. 

Victorine bowed. Mrs. Hennery looked sharply at her. 

“ How old are you?" said Mrs. Hennery. 

“ I am nearly seventeen, ma'am," said Yictorine, coloring 
a little at the abrupt interrogation. 

“ Ever 'tended store before?" 

“No, madame." 

“ That's no objection," said Mrs. Hennery. “I'd rather 
have a new hand than one of these cut-and-dried old hags that 
think they know a deal better than you do about your own 
business. Well, I'll try you." 

Victorine's anxious face brightened — she had scarcely ex- 
pected so prompt an engagement. 

“ Five dollars a week, " said Mrs. Hennery. “ And if you 
earn it, more! I hope you're good-tempered?" 

“ 1 will endeavor to be, ma’am," said Victorine, rather 
embarrassed. 

“Because it's a trying place," said Mrs. Hennery, with a 
shake of the chocolate-colored front. “ Between the num- 
bers getting off the books, and the books off the shelves, and 
some people inquiring for what you haven't got, and others 
not knowing whether they want ‘ The Count of Monte-Cristo,’ 
or 4 Orley Farm,' and everybody calling for the latest novel at 
once, as if one could afford a hundred copies, and the fines, 
and the extras, and the subscriptions running out, why, it's 
enough to drive one frantic! I should have gone crazy long 
ago if it hadn’t been for ‘ Nicholas Nickleby.' " 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


147 


4 4 For whom, madame?" 

“For 4 Nicholas Nickleby,' " said Mrs. Hennery, rubbing 
her nose. “ Dickens, you know. It always makes me laugh. 
And nobody that laughs is really miserable. 1 sit down be- 
hind the counter, and read 4 Nicholas Nickleby,' and it sets 
all the kinks straight. My dear, I think you're very like 
Kate." 

44 Kate — " hesitated' Yictorine, scarcely knowing what 
Mrs. Hennery meant. 

“ Kate Nickleby," said Mrs. Hennery. 44 If you are like 
her, I know you’ll suit. Take off your hat. Go to cata- 
loguing the books, and then you'll know just what we’ve got 
and what we haven't. " 

44 Now, ma'am?" 

“Now? Why not?" said Mrs. Hennery. “ There's no 
time like the present." 

44 Certainly," said Yictorine, laying off her shawl and hat. 

“ And I’ll go home, my dear," said Mrs. Hartford. 44 Here 
comes the little boy with the penny for the sheet of blue 
paper." 

44 All right," said Mrs. Hennery. 44 A penny earned is as 
good as a penny saved. It's a poor proverb that won't work 
both ways. And look here, little boy — don't carry your pen- 
nies in your mouth again. " 


CHAPTER XXYII. 

CAUGHT IN THE REBOUND. 

Oliver St. Charles was one of those “ curled darlings " 
of the world of sunshine and prosperity whose course in life 
seems destined to be all unruffled. With almost limitless 
wealth at his control — with the tide of circumstances appar- 
ently bending to his will, with every occurrence apjiarently in 
his favor, he never yet had wished or asked in vain. And now 
his Waterloo had come. 

For the first time in his life he had really been in love— 
deeply and sincerely. For the first time in his life ho had 
been repulsed with coldness and decision— repulsed in such a 
manner that no room for doubt or hope was left. He had 
asked Victorine Avenel to be his wife— and Victorine had un- 
equivocally refused him. And, so far as human ken could 
discover, there was an end of the matter. 

It was scarcely in human nature, under the stress of cir- 
cumstances like these, not to be hurt, indignant, and deeply 


==— ” ■ — 


148 


LOTTIE AND. VICT01UNE. 


mortified. Oliver St. Charles was all three. And, just at this 
time, as he was slowly pacing up and down the library, with 
his arms folded across his breast, and his dark eyes fixed mood- 
ily on the ground, trying to realize that the beautiful chateau 
en Espagne of his life was shattered and razed to the ground, 
Sara Fordham entered into his presence. 

Miss Fordham was not entirely unaware of the curious net- 
work of occurrences which had lately braided themselves about 
the existence at Charlesworth. Puzzled and surprised at 
what she judged Victorine’s unaccountable conduct, she had 
boldly demanded the reason of Mr. Avenel Churchleigh, and 
he, carried away by paternal indignation and the heat of the 
moment, had done what he seldom allowed himself to be be- 
trayed into doing — told the truth. 

“ She is a fool!” said Mr. Churchleigh, wiping his hot lips 
on a faintly scented pocket-handkerchief. “ She might have 
been mistress of Charlesworth — and instead of that, she has 
chosen beggary!” 

“ It can't be possible!” said Sara Fordham, turning a deep 
red and then ghastly white. 

“ Halloo!” thought Mr. Churchleigh, “ sets the wind in 
that quarter? Miss Fordham, too, has entertained her little 
hopes of winning the golden prize! 5 ” > 

And so, not without a sort of quiet, ‘malicious satisfaction, 
he told the whole story, just as it had actually occurred. 

“ Yes,” said he, in a mildly mournful voice, “ it is but too 
true. Of course. Miss Fordham, in speaking to you thus con- 
fidentially, I expect my remarks to be received in the same 
spirit?” 

“ Oh, certainly,” said Sara, who had clutched nervously at 
the back of the nearest chair for support, while her color still 
varied, and her lips quiver. 

“Yes,” nodded Mr. Churchleigh, “she has refused Mr. 
St. Charles, and gone away in a fit of girlish willfulness. 
But she'll come back. {There is no sort of doubt but that 
she'll come back when she has had time to consider the idiotic 
folly of which she has been guilty. Girls are perfectly unac- 
countable at times,” with a smile and a shrug of the shoulders; 
“ and 1, for one, don't pretend to understand the freaks of 
your charming sex, Miss Fordham. ” 

“Yes,” said Sara, absently. Very evidently she was not 
thinking of Mr. Avenel Churchleigh’s words. “ And Mr. St. 
Charles,” she added, “ is he very much disappointed?” 

“ Heart-broken,” answered Mr. Churchleigh, in a niys- 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


149 


terious whisper. “ I tell him to wait patiently, but who ever 
knew Youth and Love to comprehend the theory of patience?” 

Sara did not answer — she was gnawing unconsciously at her 
lower lip. 

“ I suppose you are going on the fishing-party with all the 
rest of the young folks?” said Mr. Churchleigh, after a few 
seconds of silence. 

“ I — I don't think I shall,” said Sara, rousing herself from 
her reverie. 4 6 1 did promise, but 1 have a sort of dull head- 
ache. Perhaps 1 shall be better at home.” 

“ 1 suppose I must go,” sighed Mr. Churchleigh, “little 
as my spirit is addicted to gayety just at present. St. Charles 
wishes me to take the place of host — and I can scarcely re- 
fuse. Adieu. Au revoir !” 

And he kissed his finger-tips gallantly to Miss Fordham 
as he left the room. 

“ What a fool he is!” said Sara impatiently to herself. 
“ As if I cared for him and his concerns! Thank goodness he 
is gone, and I can think a little now. So Victorine Avenel 
has actually been mad enough to refuse Mr. St. Charles! Yes 
— mad is the only word that can fitly express it! What does 
the girl expect? a prince? a duke? or a king in his imperial 
robes? And she has refused him ! Now, if ever, is my chance. 
A heart in the rebound, they say, is easily caught — and a little 
judiciously spoken sympathy can certainly not be misapplied.” 

And so it came that Sara Fordham entered the library where 
Oliver St. Charles had promised himself at least an hour of 
solitude. 

“ Oh, Mr. St. Charles,” she faltered, apparently undecided 
whether to retreat or advance, “ pardon me. But 1 could not 
keep away. I have heard it all — from Mr. Churchleigh. And 
1 am so surprised — so deeply grieved — at dear Victorine's 
conduct.” 

Mr. St. Charles was a host and a gentleman— and he re- 
strained the annoyance he felt at this undesired intrusion, 
merely inclining his head, and inwardly hoping that Miss 
Fordham would retire, now that she had expressed her senti- 
ments upon the subject. But Miss Fordham showed no such 
intention. She sat down, instead, on the sofa opposite, and 
looked up into his face with eyes swimming in tears. 

“ Oh, Mr. St. Charles,” she went on, “ I loved her, too! 
She has left me, also!” 

Oliver St. Charles's face softened a little. Sara Fordham 
was wiser in her generation than the children of light, and 
had contrived to establish a mutual bond of sorrow between 


150 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


their two hoarts. He held out his hand to her without a 
word. She pressed it convulsively, and, somewhat to his sur- 
pise, did not let it go, but drooped her flushed face over it. 

“ I could forgive her,” she murmured, “ for being untrue to 
me ; but, oh, how could she repulse your noble heart? Oh, 
if 1 had been in her place—” 

And then she dropped St. Charles’s hand and sunk down 
upon the sofa, hiding her face upon its edge. 

“ Oh, what have I said? What have I said?” she sobbed. 
“ Don’t listen to me, please. Go away and forget that I 
ever existed. Papa shall take me back to the Manor to-morrow, 
and all shall be as it was before, except — except — except — 
Oh, Mr. St. Charles,” looking up with imploring, tear-wet 
eyes, “ only tell me that you will not despise me for this in- 
voluntary revelation of my love!” 

Nothing renders the human heart softer and more sympa- 
thetically tender to others than the alchemic influence of 
♦ suffering. Love is akin to pity. And Oliver St. Charles, 
looking down upon the blushing face of the girl whom he be- 
lieved to have unconsciously revealed to him the secret recesses 
of her soul, told himself that if he could not drink of the cup 
of happiness himself, he might at least help to make another 
wretched heart happy. 

“ It matters little what becomes of me,” he thought. “ My 
hopes are blighted forever, and if by any possibility I can help 
to make this poor, impulsive child happy, ought I to put aside 
the opportunity?” 

Thus reasoning within himself he advanced to Sara. 

“ Miss Fordham,” said he, quietly, “ you know my whole 
history. You know that I have given my love to one who has 
spurned it from her. If, knowing all this, you can yet accept 
a life that has lost its first freshness — ” 

Sara Fordham could scarcely believe in her own senses. 
She had deemed the experiment worthy of trial, but she had 
never dreamed of success as brilliant as this. Springing to 
her feet she ran to Mr. St. Charles and burst into fresh tears 
of joy and exultation on his shoulder. 

“ Oh. 1 love you, I love you!” was all that she could say 
in her hysterical sobbings. 

“ Poor thing!” murmured St. Charles, softly, as he stroked 
down the shining masses of her abundant flaxen hair. “ Poor 
loving little soul! my life will not be altogether objectless in 
the world if I can give something of completeness to yours.” 

It was rather a cold and spiritless wooing; but such as it 


i 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 151 

was, Sara Fordham was content, ay— more than content, 
with it. 

“ Upon my word, Say, you've played your cards pretty 
well," said the disconsolate Francis, when he heard it — which, 
in common with the rest of the Charlesworth guests, Sara took 
care should be pretty promptly. 44 There's lots of girls will 
be ready to eat their heads off for envy of you! But how a 
man who had once been in love— or pretended to be in love — 
with a girl like Vic Avenel, could ever content himself with an 
after-dose like you — " 

And Frank closed his sentence with a very significant grim- 
ace. But Sara had conquered, and she could afford to be in- 
dulgent to her brother. 

44 We 'shall always be happy to see you and papa and 
mamma at Charlesworth," said she, graciously; 44 and 1 hope 
you'll visit us often." 

44 Oho!" said Frank, with a laugh, 44 it seems that you're 
putting on the airs and graces of 4 My Lady ' very promptly. 
Take care you don't count your chickens before they're 
hatched! St. Charles may back out of the bargain yet." 

44 1 am not afraid of that," said Sara, contemptuously. 
“ And I do hope, Frank, you will endeavor to be a little less 
coarse and common in your expressions." 

44 1 am not good enough for Mrs. St. Charles, eh?" said 
Frank. 

The tidings of the sudden and unexpected engagement was 
received in a variety of ways by the guests at Charlesworth. 
Some were indignant — some surprised — some quietly incredu- 
lous — but to none of them did Oliver St. Charles vouchsafe 
the slightest explanation or remark on the subject. He re- 
ceived their tardy and constrained congratulations with quiet 
dignity, and said just what was necessary, and no more. And if 
Miss Fordham thought that he might have seemed a little more 
demonstrative and lover-like, she was wise enough to keep 
that opinion to herself. But one bit of womanly malice, one 
morsel of exquisitely secret revenge, she could not bring herself 
to forego — a letter to Victorine Avenel, announcing her com- 
ing nuptials. 

44 1 don't exactly know where she is," thought Sara, 44 but, 
of course, any communication addressed to the care of Mrs. 
Hartford will reach her. And 1 should so like to see her face 
when she reads it!" 

And so, with heart beating high with hope and anticipation, 
she sat down to her desk and wrote a letter to Victorine 
Avenel, as follows: 


152 


LOTTIE A HD VICTORINE. 


“My darling Vic, — I can not resist the temptation to 
tell you of my happiness, although I scarcely know whether or 
not you will care to hear it. Only guess! But I’m sure you 
could not, if you were to try from now until doomsday. I’m 
going to be married! And the happy man is — who do you 
think? None other than Oliver St. Charles! Of course you 
will say it is impossible, because he once made love to you. 
But a man has a great many of these fever-fancies, you know, 
before he settles down to the one great affection of his life- 
time — and I always said, you remember, that Oliver St. 
Charles loved me. And I only wish you could see how de- 
voted he is! Oh, I am so happy! Of course you acted for the 
best in refusing him, because if a man really does not love 
you, it is scarcely wise to entangle him in the matrimonial net 
— and your instincts always were honest on such subjects. 
We arc to be married on the first of September. Dear papa 
has given me absolute carte blanche as to my things, and 1 
have three dress-makers busy at work. Oh, my dear, there 
is so much to do, and such a delicious bewilderment of affairs. 
We should be so delighted to have you at Charlesworth for 
the wedding — Oliver particularly wishes me to invite you.” 
(This last, it may be well to mention, was an entirely gratui- 
tous falsehood on the part of Miss Ford ham, put in for the 
especial discomfiture of poor Victorine.) “ I’ll keep the lists 
of bride-maids open until I hear from you, as I always prom- 
ised, you know, that you should carry the glove and bouquet 
at my wedding. Write soon, dear, for I shall be dying to hear 
from you. With a thousand kisses, I remain ever your affec- 
tionate, Sara. 

“ Miss Avenel.” 

Victorine Avenel had just come home from her weary day’s 
work in the domains of Mrs. Hennery, when Lucy Hartford 
ran down the long drawing-room toward her, holding up the 
white, oblong missive. 

“A letter, Miss Avenel, a letter,” said she. Victorine grew 
pale — her heart throbbed spasmodically, as the possibility pre- 
sented itself to her of Oliver St. Charles having renewed his 
suit by letter. But the next minute she was calm again, al- 
though a bitter pang of disappointment chilled her veins on 
perceiving that the address was written in no strong masculine 
chirography, but the loose, untidy scrawl that she at once rec- 
ognized as that of Sara Ford ham. 

Listlessly she sat down and opened it, but the color deep- 
ened, and her breath came thick and fast, as she read the con- 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


153 


tents. Nor did she pause until her eye, traveling with nervous 
restlessness down each perfumed page, had reached the signa- 
ture-— and then she flung it from her, with a low cry, half 
passion, half contempt;' for in spite of her assumed philosophy, 
she was cut to the very heart by this smoothly veiled insult. 

“ I knew — I knew he did not care for me!” she cried out, 
half aloud; “but 1 never believed he could transfer his pro- 
posals to another so readily. But 1 am growing wiser and 
wiser in this world’s experiences!” 

She sat down to her little desk the instant she reached her 
own room and wrote an answer: 

“ Dear Sara, — I beg you will accept my congratulations, 
both for yourself and Mr. St. Charles, upon your coming mar- 
riage. 1 regret that I shall be unable to be present. Yours 
truly, V. Avenel. ” 

“ There,” she said to herself, “ that is over! And now 1 
must settle down as best I may to the lead-colored life that is 
before me.” 

She smiled as the thought eddied through her brain, but it 
was not a smile of pleasure. 

“ Upon my word,” cried Sara Fordham, when she tore 
open the letter, “ this is short and sweet. Look, Oliver, what 
Vic says.” 

For Mr. St. Charles had ridden over to Fordham Manor 
that morning, and chanced to be in the room when the mail 
was brought in. 

With an effort he took the letter and read it. 

“ She is very polite,” he said, constrainedly. 

“ Polite — yes— but wouldn’t you think she would have made 
an effort to be present at our wedding?” 

“ 1 suppose she suits herself,” said Mr. St. Charles. 

But even while he spoke in cold, measured accents, he was 
conscious of a thrill surging through all his veins, as he held 
in his grasp the paper that her hand had rested on so brief 
awhile ago, and the old love blazed up in his heart hot and 
passionate as ever. And Conscience, cold and merciless, 
demanded of him if it was right to wed one woman while he 
still loved another with all the force and loyalty of his nature. 

“ It is too late,” he told himself, “ to argue that point now. 
My destiny is sealed. As for Victorine— my lost Victorine — 
she has chosen her own destiny, and it only remains now for 
us both to abide by it.” 


154 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE* 


CHAPTER XXVIII, 

WHO ARE THE FALCONB RIDGES? 

It was a brilliant morning in mid July — one of those morn- 
ings on which the sky seems clear and cloudless as the painted 
heavens of Italy, and the magnificent peaks of the White 
Mountains lie against the deep blue as if they were cut in 
cameo. The robins were singing clamorously in the woods, 
the silver waters of the Ammonoosuc River rushed musically 
over their rocky bed, and the great six-horse stages were 
thundering up in front of the hotel, to receive their freight of 
merry human life, bound some for the Xotch, some for the 
Mount Washington Railway, some for the Falls of the Am- 
monoosuc, and some for the old Willey House. All was life 
and activity, bustle and laughter. 

Mr. Hugh Hampshire, “ mine host " of theFolliott Mount- 
ain House, stood on the broad veranda, with his hands in his 
pockets, and in high good humor. The season at the Mount- 
ain House had, so far, been eminently a success, and Mr. 
Hampshire was hoping to render it more successful yet, before 
the first frost should scatter his guests as the red leaves fly be- 
fore the October blast. Under these circumstances, it was 
scarcely strange that Mr. Hampshire's jovial and rubicund 
countenance should beam, and his even white teeth display 
themselves ever and anon in a smile that rippled up from the 
very satisfaction of his heart. 

As he stood there, helping to pack his guests into the mam- 
moth stages which were to carry them off for a day's amuse- . 
ment among the mountains, a light tripping footfall sounded 
close by, and a clear, musical voice addressed him: 

“ Here's something for you, Mr. Hampshire." 

44 Another telegram, eh?" said Mr. Hampshire. “ Much 
obliged, Miss Avenel. 1 dare say it's about that poultry con- 
tract in Bellinger's Falls. Eh! what — it’s from the Falcon- 
bridges! Well, upon my word, I didn't look for 'em until 
this day week. Really, this is very extraordinary, indeed. 
May 1 ask. Miss Avenei, if Mr. Elfield is anywhere around?" 

“ I saw him in the office just now," said Lottie, slowly re- 
turning to her post, but not without a reluctant glance or so 
at the waving, woods, the sapphire sky, and the merry party 
of voyageurs just ready to start. Lottie Avenel was neither 
more nor less than human, after all, and her little room, with 
its perpetual “ click," “ click," was not so attractive to her 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 155 

eighteen-year-old heart as the outer world of sunshine and 
beauty from which she seemed at present to be debarred. 

Mr. Elfield, the clerk, was where hotel clerks generally are, 
behind the counter, his pen balanced on the tip of his ear, and 
a huge hotel register open in front of him. He was a little, 
natty man, with a fresh complexion, light hair, brushed so as 
to cover a place that showed signs of premature baldness, and 
light, protruding eyes, shielded by a pair of gossamer-framed 
eyeglasses. He was the very man for the place, with his pleas- 
ant, smiling face, his active, personal interest in every one's 
affairs, and his soft, insinuating voice. 

44 Elfield," said Mr. Hampshire, bustling into the sanctum. 

44 Sir," said Mr. Elfield. 

“ The Falconbridges are coming to-night. Look at this 
telegram." 

44 All right," said Mr. Elfield, who would not have showed 
any signs of being mentally off his balance if he had heard 
unexpectedly that the Prince and Princess of Wales, or the 
Emperor of China, with his pigtailed suite, were to arrive by 
early trains at the Folliott Mountain House. 

44 Are the rooms ready?" demanded Mr. Hampshire. 

44 Quite so, I believe," said Mr. Elfield. 

44 1 hope everything will be suitable and proper," added 
mine host, anxiously. 

44 I've not the least reason to doubt it," said Mr. Elfield, 
soothingly. While Lottie, in her little den heard all the dis- 
cussion, and wondered who on earth the Falconbridges were, 
that their expected arrival should create such a sensation in a 
monster hotel like the Folliott Mountain House, where hum 
dreds came and went daily. 

44 Who are the Falconbridges, anyhow?" said she, in a 
laughing whisper, to Elfield, when Mr. Hampshire had bustled 
off in quest of the housekeeper, the head-waiter, and half a 
dozen other officials who were supposed to be directly and in- 
directly interested in the question of the new arrivals. 

44 They're the people that have engaged our best suite of 
rooms, and paid for it, during the last two weeks," said Mr. 
Elfield. 

44 But that's not telling me who they are," said Lottie. 

44 Bostonians," said Mr. Elfield, speaking indistinctly, with 
a pen in his mouth. 44 Rich as Croesus. Travel with a Swiss 
valet and two French maids." 

44 Dear me," said Lottie, opening her velvet-black eyes very 
wide indeed. 44 How splendid it must be to be rich! And is 
there a very numerous party?" 


15 G 


LOTTIE AND VICT0R1NE. 


“ Only four/ 5 said Mr. Elfield. “ The old gentleman and 
lady, a son, and an adopted relative— some sort of a cousin, 

I believe— Miss Valencia Eden. Pretty name, isn’t it?” 

“ I wonder if they have any of them lost the use of their 
limbs?” said Lottie, gravely. 

“Not that 1 know of,” said Mr. Elfield, looking up. 

“ Why?” 

“If they’re in no way crippled,” said Miss Avenel, “ I 
don’t see why they need three people to wait on them.” 

“ It’s a mere matter of habit, I suppose,” said Mr. Elfield, 
half smiling. “ You and 1, Miss Avenel, would prefer to wait 
on ourselves.” 

“ I’m not altogether so certain of that,” said Lottie, medi- 
tatively. “ You’ve no idea, Mr. Elfield, how lazy I can be 
sometimes. I think a French maid would be a positive luxury, 
at times.” 

“ I shouldn’t have believed that of you,” said Mr. Elfield, 
laughing. 

Just then a servant stepped up to take counsel with the clerk 
about some disputed question, and almost simultaneously a 
message came over the wires to one of the guests staying in 
the house; and so the discussion came to an end. 

But when the evening express blew its sonorous steam whistle 
in front of the Folliott Mountain House, Lottie watched the 
incoming stream of travelers, with more than her ordinary 
amount of interest, from the glazed window of the telegraph 
office. 

“ That must be the Falconbridge party,” said Lottie, half 
aloud, as she caught sight of a tall, white-haired old gentle- 
man, with a young lady almost equally tall leaning on his arm 
— a young lady whose superb traveling-dress of silver-gray 
silk, and plumed French hat, struck our poor little heroine with 
admiration and amazement. J ust behind, an old lady trailed 
her rich black silks over the marble pavement of the hall, her 
hand resting on the arm of a chestnut-haired young Adonis, 
whom Lottie thought, on the impulse of the moment, was the 
handsomest man she had ever seen in her life. All these ob- 
servations she made in the twinkling of an eye. And next 
followed, the Swiss valet, whom Lottie would certainly have ' 
taken to be an independent gentleman on his own account, so 
spotless was his linen ar.d stylishly cut his dark garments, had 
it not been for the baskets, bags, novels, and traveling-rugs, - 
he carried; while the two French maids tripped on behind, 
one giggling and whispering, the other silent, composed, and 
somewhat austere in her inien. 


LOTTIE AND VICTOKINE. 


157 


“ I should be afraid of that French maid/- thought Lottie. 
“ I think I like the little laughing one the best. But what 
sparkling blue eyes that young Mr. Falconbridge has! I won- 
der — ” 

And Lottie AveneFs mind wandered off into a region of 
conjecture and dim probability, lighted only by the glitter of 
Wallace Falconb ridge’s violet-blue eyes. Not that Lottie had 
the slightest idea of losing her heart to Wallace Falconbridge. 
But she had an instinctive liking for all beautiful things, 
whether human or natural, and somehow this particular young 
Adonis had appeared before her vision, surrounded by the il- 
lusive glitter <5 wealth, station, and social distinction. And 
so absorbed was she in this day-dream, that when Mr. Hamp- 
shire came and requested her to telegraph to Bellinger Falls 
for sixty watermelons and forty spring chickens, she made it 
“ six muskmelons and four children !” 

Mr. Featherstone, the farmer at Bellinger Falls, promptly 
telegraphed back. 

“ What on earth do you mean by such a message as that?” 


Mr. Hampshire stared, as he perused and reperused the slip 
of paper. Lottie colored scarlet, “ It’s all my mistake,” 
said she, laughing, “ I don’t know what on earth I was think- 
ing of. It shall be set right in a minute.” 

“ You have been here three months. Miss Avenel,” said Mr. 
Hampshire, “ and you have never made a blunder yet— until 
now.” 


“ And it shall be the last,” said Lottie, half smiling, but 
deeply annoyed. “ Upon my word and honor it shall be the 
last, if only you won’t report me at head-quarters. ” 

Mr. Hampshire laughed and went good-humoredly away. 
Mr. Elfield returned to his books, where he was discussing the 
subject of a disputed room with a peppery little man who ob- 
jected vehemently to three flights of stairs— and Lottie, 
taking a little hand-mirror from her desk, looked sternly and 
fixedly at the reflection of her own dimpled face as mirrored 
there. 

“ Lottie Avenel,” she said, addressing herself in an ener- 
getic whisper, “ what a fool you are! If you can’t behave 
yourself better. I’ll discharge you without a character. Now, 
attend to your business, or I’ll know the reason why.” 

Thus vehemently adjured by the sensible Lottie Avenel, 
the flighty and visionary Lottie Avenel did very well for the 
next tVvo or three hours, and had nearly forgotten all about 
the four children, the six muskmelons, and the tall young 


'w- v->’ -r ' ^ g^'jp^s^V'JL- 


158 LOTTIE AND VICTOEINE. 

Adonis with the chestnut curls and sparkling azure eyes, 
when an unexpected accident revived the chain of association 
as freshly as ever. 

“Nine o’clock!” said Lottie, addressing Mr. Elfield over 
the top of the plate-glass partition. * ‘ 1 haven’t had a mes- 
sage for twenty minutes.” 

“ Dull, eh?” said Mr. Elfield, who could talk without lift- 
ing his eyes and attention from liis work. 

“ Wofully dull,” said Lottie, screwing up her dimpled lips 
into a grimace. “ I wonder if you’d lend me a newspaper.” 

“ With pleasure,” said Mr. Elfield. “ Shall it be the 
4 Daily Bulletin ’ or the 4 Morning Sparrow-hawk?’ ” 

“ 1 don’t care which, so that it’s something to read,” said 
Lottie. And she had just concentrated her attention on the 
“ foreign ” columns of the “ Daily Bulletin,” when a shadow 
crossed the glass front of her tiny domain, and throwing aside 
her newspaper, she found herself looking directly into the 
handsome oval face and deep blue eyes of Wallace Falcon- 
bridge. 

He bowed; Lottie blushed a little in spite of herself.' 

“ 1 wish to telegraph to Montreal for a Russia leather 
traveling-case, marked ‘V. E. ’ that was accidentally left there 
this morning,” said he, courteously. “ Is the operator in?” 

“ / am the operator,” said Lottie, blushing deeper than 
ever. 

“ You!” said Mr. Wallace Falconbridge, a little incredu- 
lously. 

“ Yes, I,” returned Lottie, recovering her self-possession 
instantly. “ I will take your message, if you please, sir.” 

“ But — pardon me if I seem rude — you are not the regular 
operator here?” questioned Falconbridge. 

“ Certainly I am,” said Lottie, half smiling, and looking 
distractingly pretty. “ Why shouldn’t 1 be?” 

“ I know of no reason,” said Mr. Falconbridge, reddening 
slightly in his turn. And he wrote his message on a slip of 
paper with great accuracy and exactness. 

That done, and having ascertained that no probable answer 
could be expected before the morning of the next day, he went 
upstairs to his room and smoked a meditative cigar, staring 
the while out at the starry constellations that were slowly 
settling behind the mountain crests. 

“ It’s a face like a cherub’s,” he said to himself. “ I’ve 
seen just such pure brows, just such dimpled lips, in the old 
frescoed church ceilings at Rome. And her eyes are like 
wells of jetty light— long, soft and almond-shaped. I won- 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


159 


der, now, if I've fallen in love with this beautiful mountain 
lass. I don't consider myself a susceptible young man, at 
least, I never have hitherto, but I do believe I'm hard hit this 
time. For, do what I will, read, write, or meditate, I ciTn't 
get those soft, Oriental eyes out of my head. They haunt me 
like a half-forgotten dream." 

While, at almost the same time, Lottie Avenel, nestling 
asleep among the scented pillows of her little room at the very 
top of the house, was dreaming of the blue eyes that had shone 
upon her so brief a while ago. 

She had inexorably resolved she would not think of him 
during her waking hours; that she would not even let her 
mind wander in his direction. But who can control the thou- 
sand caprices and vagaries of sleep? 

In short, it was a well-authenticated case of mutual attrac- 
tion, having some of the symptoms of a yet more complicated 
affair— love at first sight. 

For the same tormentor which had made Victorine Avenel 
so wretched in the stately halls of Charles worth had found 
poor Lottie out among the dim peaks of the White Mount- 
ains. It was the old, old story over again. 

“ Love rules the camp, the court, the grove, 

And earth beneath, and heaven above : 

For love is heaven, and heaven is love.” 


CHAPTER XXIX. 

VALENCIA'S EYES ARE OPENED. 

If it had been within the limits of possibility that Wallace 
Falconbridge's life could be prolonged to the fabulous length 
of that of the old patriarchs, he never would have forgotten 
that golden summer-tide in the White Mountains. Hay by 
day went by, soft and radiant as a dream of Arcadia— night 
after night swept its star-spangled curtain over the solemn 
blue heights of the “ everlasting hills," and with every pass- 
ing moment the invisible net-work of Love's chains wove 
itself closer and more invulnerably around his heart. 

. The Falconbridges knew everybody — or at least it would 
seem so, from the circle of friends and acquaintances that 
gathered around them immediately on their arrival at the 
Folliott Mountain House, and kept changing and altering in 
proportion as the tourists of the fashionable world came and 
went. Parties and excursions to all the neighboring points of 
interest were organized almost daily — picnics, walking expo- 


160 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


ditions, fern-seeking groups, and fishing-parties, while in the 
evening the mammoth parlor, with its acres of Brussels car- 
peting and square yards of glittering mirrors, was alive with 
music and dancing. 

“ Upon my word,” said Miss Valencia Eden, “ the White 
Mountains are gayer than any place we have seen since we left 
home. What do you say, Aunt Marian?” (her pot name for 
the old lady, who was in reality nothing more than a distant 
cousin), “ shall we alter our plans, and make our sojourn here 
six weeks instead of three?” 

“ Just as Wallace says,” said Aunt Marian, complacently. 
She was one of those serene, placid, elderly individuals whose 
silver curls are never crumpled, whose costly laces are always 
immaculate, and who look as if they might have been just 
taken out of a glass case on Broadway. “ Of course it’s very 
pleasant here, and your uncle finds the mountain air most in- 
vigorating; but Wallace is really in command of our traveling 
campaign. What do you say, my son?” with a glance of par- 
donable maternal pride at the tall fellow who was sitting in 
the opposite casement, running his eye over the columns of 
the morning paper. 

“ About staying on here? Oh, let us stay, by all means,” 
Mr. Wallace Falconbridge made answer, with alacrity. 

' 4 Where’s the use of leaving a place that we know is jolly, to 
look up some other spot that may not suit us half as well?” 

“ In that case,” said Miss Eden, “ 1 shall telegraph to Ma- 
dame Boivin to send me a maize crepe dress for the hop on 
Monday week. I’ve worn all my dresses, and one doesn’t 
want to appear a dowdy where every one dresses so elegantly. 
Shall 1 order anything for you, Aunt Marian?” 

Mrs. Falconbridge mildly shook the silver-gray curls. 

“ No, my dear,” said she, “ I think not. My black silks 
are very nice, and 1 haven’t worn my lead-colored moire an- 
tique yet, nor the lavender checked summer silk. But send 
for what you want at once. I don’t want 'my girl to look less 
charming than any of the others.” 

“ Darling aunty, you are so kind,” said Valencia Eden, 
pressing her lips to the old lady’s forehead. “ And 1 think I 
will order a white lace shawl, too, while I’m about it.” 

“Just write the message and I’ll take it down-stairs for 
you,” said Wallace, rising with an air of the serenest non- 
chalance. 

“ It's very kind of you, I’m sure,” said Miss Eden, unsus- 
pectingly. 

Miss Eden was not exactly a beauty, but she was what 




LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


101 


every one called a very handsome girl. Rather large and 
Juno-like in her proportions,, with a rich, olive complexion, 
hazel-dark eyes, rather rounder and harder in their glitter 
than she herself would have preferred, and full, red lips, she 
was one of those who depend almost entirely on dress to set. 
off their charms. Jewels, silks, and sumptuous cashmeres 
became her style, and she availed herself of their aid to every 
extent. She herself believed in her own beauty — she be- 
lieved, also, in her own future. Five years ago Aunt Marian 
had invited her to come for a months visit to the great house 
in Bostou. Valencia had grasped eagerly at the opportunity, 
for she was one of a large and impecunious family of girls, 
dwelling in an insignificant little eastern town, who had to 
choose between factories and school teaching for a livelihood. 
And so well had she improved her opportunities that Mrs. 
Falconbridge had invited her to prolong her stay indefinitely, 
and now she was almost like a daughter in the old lady’s 
partial eyes. 

“ I think Wallace likes her; I’m almost sure he does,” s^id 
Mrs. Falconbridge to her husband. “ And I think I should 
have nothing left to desire in all the world if Wallace and 
Valencia were once married.” 

As for Miss Eden herself, she was quietly maneuvering to- 
ward the same object. Wallace Falconbridge was very rich, 
and an only son. Valencia was very poor, save for Aunt 
Marian’s bountiful kindness — and one of a family of nine sis- 
ters. Consequently, Miss Valencia meant to marry Wallace 
Falconbridge. 

Mrs. Falconbridge had gone to her room for a midday 
siesta, Mr. Falconbridge was in the reading-room with half a 
dozen other old gentlemen, and Miss Eden was looking over 
her wardrobe, with an eye to the forthcoming full-dress hop, 
when Miss J ulia Pettigrew knocked at the door— ostensibly to 
borrow a spool of sewing silk, really to make herself as dis- 
agreeable as she could. 

“So provoking that you can’t buy anything here,” said 
she. ‘ ‘ At Long Branch and Saratoga there are such delight- 
ful little shops for worsted, thread and needles, and fancy 
articles. I’m so sorry to trouble you, dear.” 

“It’s no trouble at all,” said Valencia, secretly wishing 
Miss Pettigrew at the bottom of the Red Sea. But Miss Petti- 
grew was apparently in no hurry at all. 

“ I suppose your dear aunt has gone to lie down?” said she, 

. leaning against the window. 

^ “I believe so,” said Miss Eden. 



» 


c 


162 


LOTTIE AND VICTOIUNE. 


“ Such a charming lady!” said Miss Pettigrew. 

“ Very,” said Valencia. 

“And your cousin— young Mr. Falconbridge — I suppose 
he’s paying his devoirs down at the telegraph office?” 

“ Yes,” said Valencia, as yet impervious to hints and in- 
nuendoes; “ I sent him with a message to m.y dress-maker in 
Boston.” 

Miss Pettigrew laughed a little meaning chuckle. 

“ 1 dare say it’s a business that’s particularly congenial to 
his feelings,” said she. 

“ What?” demanded Valencia, looking up with a puzzled 
air. 

“ Telegraphic messages,” giggled Miss Pettigrew. 

“ I haven’t the least idea what you mean,” said Miss 
Eden. “ Of course, Wallace is always ready to take down a 
message for me. ” 

“ Haven’t you really heard?” said Miss Pettigrew, with her 
head one side, like a bird’s. 

“ Heard what?” 

Half the hotel is talking about it,” went on Miss Petti- 
grew. 

“ Talking about what?” cried Valencia, starting to her 
feet. “Julia, what do you mean? Leave off talking in rid- 
dles, and be explicit.” 

“ Well, I declare!” said Miss Pettigrew, who had not yet 
forgotten sundry slights and snubs received at the hands of 
Miss Eden, and secretly enjoyed her discomfiture. “ Then 
you really haven’t heard of the desperate flirtation between 
Mr. Wallace Falconbridge and the pretty girl in the telegraph 
office below?” 

“ What pretty girl?” demanded Valencia. 

“ Don’t you know? The operator. ” 

“ Nonsense!” said Valencia, keeping up a brave front, 
although her heart within l^r seemed turning into a lump of 
ice. 

“ Perhaps it is nonsense,” said Miss Pettigrew, with a toss 
of her head. “ If so. I’m not the only person who has 
noticed this nonsense . He spends half his time loitering 
down there in the office, making love to that girl.” 

“ Is she pretty?” asked Valencia, forcing herself to the 
question. 

“You don’t mean that you have never noticed her when 
you have passed through the office?” 

“ Why should I notice her? A mere telegraph girl?” said 
Valencia, haughtily. 


LOTTIE AND VICTOR1NE. 


163 


“ Very pretty,” said Miss Pettigrew. 4 4 Dark and spark- 
ling, with bold, black eyes, and such a color that 1 believe she 
paints.” 

Valencia bit her lip. 

44 1 dare say it’s all idle gossip,” said she. 44 Wallace could 
never so far forget his family and station as to notice a girl 
like that.” 

“ Men do strange things, sometimes, where a pair of bright 
eyes- are concerned,” said Miss Pettigrew. “ Of course, 1 
should have mentioned it before, only I supposed that you 
knew all about it.” 

And Miss Pettigrew went away, feeling the delightful con- 
sciousness that she was quits with Miss Eden at last. 

Valencia sat thinking a minute or two, after Miss Pettigrew 
had gone, and then she rang the bell. 

44 Florine,” she said to the French maid whom Mrs. Fal- 
conbridge had engaged especially to wait on her, 44 go down 
and see if Mr. Wallace is in the office, and if he is, ask him to 
please step up into our sitting-room for a minute.” 

44 Old, mademoiselle chirped Florine, and away she 


tripped. 

Presently Wallace Falconbridge's light, elastic footfall 
sounded opposite the door. 

44 Did you send for me, Val?” he asked. 

44 1 forgot one thing — a sash of black Chantilly lace, to wear 
with the dress I ordered,” said Valencia, with a simulated 
smile. 44 Would it be too much trouble for you to send an- 
other message to Madame Boivin?” 

44 Not at all,” said unconscious Wallace, falling headlong 
into the trap. “Black Chantilly — what? Just write it 
down, Val, please. 1 never pretend to understand your femi- 
nine frippery. ” 

Valencia wrote the name on a half sheet of tinted note- 
paper, with a hand that trembled a little in spite of her reso- 
lute will, and Wallace walked off with it. 

He had scarcely closed the door when Miss Eden sjirung 
to her feet. 

“ Now is my time,” she muttered between her teeth, and 
hurried noiselessly down-stairs, keeping just sufficiently in the 
rear of her unsuspicious cousin to watch him without herself 
being seen. And on reaching the office she mingled with a 
group of ladies near the table of an old Indian who was sell- 
ing baskets, mats, and canoes made of birch-bark, affecting 
to be deeply interested in his frail and pretty wares, while she 
was in reality watching her cousin. 


164 


LOTTIE AND VICTOIUNE. 


Wallace Falconb ridge walked up to the telegraph office 
and leaned his elbows on the ledge of polished black walnut 
shelving in front of the window. Lottie AveneFs face bright- 
ened as she advanced toward her side of the glass partition, 
and the rosy crimson mantled to her face. That one glance 
was sufficient. For a second Valencia Eden studied both of 
their fair young countenances intently, and then slowly turn- 
ing, she went upstairs, her heart as heavy as lead within her. 

Going straight to Mrs. Falconbridge’s room, she tapped at 
the door. Elise Miraux, the elderly French woman, opened it. 

“ Is my aunt awake yet, Elise?” 

“It is true that she has aroused herself. Miss Eden,” said 
Elise, “ but 1 go now to arrange her hair for the hour of din- 
ner.” 

“ Never mind it just now, Elise; there’s plenty of time. I 
want to speak to my aunt.” 

Elise hesitated. To her mind the question of coiffure was 
the most important one of the day, and should be second to 
nothing. She was especially proud of the artistic erection of 
gray puffs, curls, and bandeaus which she daily and tri* daily 
built up on her mistress’s head. But Miss Eden was fully 
known in the establishment as a young lady possessing a will 
of her own, and Elise scarcely ventured to dispute her com- 
mands. 

“Very well,” said she, resignedly. “But mademoiselle 
will please remember that the time is short.” 

Miss Eden made no reply, but pushed impatiently past the 
French woman into the room where Mrs. Falconbridge sat 
before the mirror, with her wrapper of quilted blue silk on, 
and a novel in her hands, ready for Elise to commence opera- 
tions. 

“ Well, my dear,” said Mrs. Falconbridge, placidly; and 
then, chancing to look up, she caught sight of Valencia’s 
face. “ How pale you are!” she exclaimed. “ Nothing has 
happened, 1 hope?” 

“Aunt Marian,” said Valencia, hastily, “we must leave 
this place!” 

“ Leave this place!” echoed Mrs. Falconbridge. “ What 
for? Why, 1 thought we had only just concluded to stay.” 

“ Yes, 1 know; but things are altogether different now.” 

“ What things? Do, pray, my love, explain yourself,” said 
the old lady. “ I hate vague insinuations.” 

And then, in plain and unvarnished words, Valencia Eden 
told the whole story. 

“Nonsense, Valencia!” cried Mrs. Falconbridge, starting 


LOTTIE AND VIOTORINE. 165 

from her chair as the girl ceased speaking. “ It can't be 
true, you know.” 

“ Aunt Marian, I saw them with my own eyes. I know 
she loves him. And I know that he admires her, even if noth- 
ing more.” 

“ But 1 tell you it rs impossible,” cried Mrs. Falconbridge, 
more imperiously than before. “ My son would never allow 
himself to be drawn into such an absurd entanglement as 
that. I will speak to him, however. Elise!” 

And Elise Miraux, who was lurking like a spider in the 
other room, entered instantly. 

“ Send Felix down into the office immediately for Mr. Wal- 
lace; tell him I wish to speak to him at once. At once, do 
you hear?” 

The French woman courtesied and withdrew, secretly won- 
dering what all this commotion could betide, and resolved to 
solve the mystery for herself ere long, if there were any 
virtue in key-holes or the cracks of doors. 


CHAPTER XXX. 

MRS. FALCONBRIDGE INTERFERES. 

u Well, my dear mother, what's your will?” 

Wallace Falconbridge, handsome as Apollo, in his morning 
dress of cool white linen, with a black ribbon tied loosely at 
his marble-white throat, sauntered leisurely into his mother's 
presence and confronted her, leaning on the back of a chair. 

Mrs. Falconbridge sat very upright, her porcelain-blue eyes 
full of ominous light, two red spots glowing in her fair, un- 
wrinkled cheeks. Valencia stood at her side, silent and pale, 
with compressed lips and eyes resolutely averted. 

“ Wallace,” said Mrs. Falconbridge, “what is this I hear 
of you?” 

“ I don't know, mother, I'm sure,” said the young man, 
lightly. “ Is it anything worse than usual?” 

“ My son, my son, this is no joking matter,” pleaded the 
mother, piteously. 

“I don't know, until 1 hear, what it is,” said Wallace. 
But Valencia knew from the rising color in his cheeks that he 
already suspected the import of this forced interview. 

“ Wallace,” said Mrs. Falconbridge, “ they tell me you are 
carrying on a flirtation— that is the modern term, I believe — 
with the girl in the telegraph office below stairs.” 

“ They /” repeated Wallace, coldly. “ I am much obliged 
to the unknown quantity represented by the four letters,” 


166 


LOTTIE AND VICTORIA E. 


“ Is it true, my son?” questioned his mother. 

“ That I have been flirting? No, it is not.” 

Mrs. Falconbridge drew a long breath of relief. 

“lam delighted to hear it,” said she. “ From what I was 
told I drew the inference that you had really beeu allowing 
yourself to get entangled with a young person in the telegraph 
office; but I should have given you credit for more good sense, 
and—” 

“Stop, mother, stop!” said Wallace. “You are getting 
on a little too fast. I said 1 had not been flirting. Neither 
have I. But if you really wish to know how matters stand 
with me — ” 

“ Of course I do,” interrupted Mrs. Falconbridge. “ Am 
I not your mother?” 

“ Then I am quite willing to tell you. I proposed to Miss 
Avenel last night. ” 

“To Miss Avenel?” 

“ The young lady in the telegraph office. I supposed, of 
course, that you knew her name.” 

“ Wallace,” cried Mrs. Falconbridge, “ are you mad? You 
have only known her three weeks.” 

“Perhaps so. But had 1 .known her six months, or even 
six days, it would have been in no respect different,” answered 
Wallace, quietly. 

Mrs. Falconbridge clasped her hands in despair. Valencia 
advanced a step or two, with burning cheeks and eyes darting 
arrows of indignant light. 

“ And she!” cried she, scornfully, “ of course she jumped 
at the chance.” 

AVallace Falconbridge turned and looked his cousin full in 
the face. 

“ On the contrary,” said he, “ she gave me no definite an- 
swer. She said that she would take my offer into considera- 
tion — that she could not decide upon so momentous a question 
without some reflection.” 

“ She is a schemer, a sly, plotting, crafty — ” 

“ Stop, Valencia!” cried Wallace, a sudden flash of anger 
lightening into his eyes. “ You are speaking of one who is 
as good and pure and noble as one of the saints in heaven. 
Of one who, if she consents to look favorably upon my suit, 
will soon be my wife. Bemember this and order your speech 
accordingly.” 

And turning, he left the presence of the two indignant and 
bewildered ladies. 




LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 167 

Mrs. Falconbridge clasped her slender white hands and 
looked plaintively at Valencia. 

“ I'm afraid it's something serious,” faltered she. “ And 
oh, my darling, I had so set my heart on seeing you his wife.” 

Valencia threw herself on a sofa and burst into a shower of 
hot, blinding tears. 

Mrs. Falconbridge rose and bent over her, stroking her 
hair with a soft and loving touch. 

“ Valencia,” she whispered, “ tell me as woman to woman, 
did you love him?” 

“ I did — oh, God pity me, I did!” wailed the haughty girl, 
burying her face in the cushions. 

“ Then you shall yet be his wife,” said Mrs. Falconbridge. 
“ Cheer up, dearest. No son of mine shall ever throw away 
his wealth, his lineage, his pride of social station, on a stupid, 
ignorant working-girl. It is not within the limits of the pos- 
sible. ” 

“ But, Aunt Marian, he loves her.” 

“ He shall be disenchanted. I tell you, child, this is only 
a spell, cast over him by the girl's outward beauty — a glam- 
our from which he must inevitably awake, sooner or later. 
And mine shall be the rescuing hand. Look! do you see 
Wallace seeking yonder lonely mountain-path?” 

Valencia looked up, through a mist of tears, to where her 
cousin's form was faintly visible through a net-work of trees. 

“ I see him,” asid she. 

“ Very well. Then the coast is clear for me. Call Elise. 
Let her finish my toilet at once, and I will go down into the 
office myself.” 

“ What for. Aunt Marian?” 

“ To tell this aspiring young person, with my own lips, 
that it is quite in vain for her to expect ever to marry my son. 
To tell her that Wallace Falconbridge is engaged — or all 
but engaged, to my niece.” 

“ Aunt Marian!” Valencia looked at her aunt with eyes 
that were half frightened, half glad. 

“ 1 know it is an extreme measure, my dear,” said Mrs. 
Falconbridge; “ but there are occasions which justify extreme 
measures, and this is one of them. Call Elise, I say. Let 
there be no unnecessary delay.” 

Half an hour afterward Lottie Avenel was surprised by the 
unexpected appearance of Mrs. Falconbridge at her window — 
Mrs. Falconbridge, whom she knew very well by sight, 
although the stately old lady had never heretofore noticed her 
in any manner whatsoever. 


1G8 


LOTTIE AND YICTOEINE, 


“ You are Miss Avenel, 1 believe?” said Mrs. Falconbridge, 
assuming her most regal manner. 

Lottie inclined her head. 

“ 1 should like a few words with you/* said Mrs. Falcon- 
bridge. 44 Are you at leisure just now?” 

“ Certainly,” said Lottie, rising from her seat. She saw 
that a storm was impending, and had too much spirit and 
resolution to endeavor to evade it. 44 It is' rather a busy time 
in the office just now, but I dare say Mr. Leyden will take my 
place for a few minutes. Pray be seated in the reception- 
room, and 1 will come to you presently.” 

Mrs. Falconbridge obeyed, somewhat surprised' at the cool 
self-possession of “ the young person ” she had come to in- 
timidate, while Lottie dispatched the bell-boy for her friend, 
Mr. Leyden. A minute or two later she entered the recep- 
tion-room, where her lover’s mother sat nervously fanning 
herself. 

44 1 am quite at your service now, madame,” she said. 

44 1 am Mrs. Falconbridge,” said the elder lady, in a tone 
which carried something of the same weight of station as if she 
had said, 44 1 am her majesty the queen.” 

44 Yes,” said Lottie, quietly. 44 1 believe I have seen you 
pass through the office once or twice.” 

Mrs. Falconbridge hesitated — she felt .that she had scarcely 
made the impression she wished and intended. 

44 1— I believe,” she began, rather lamely, 44 that you are 
acquainted with my son, Mr. Wallace Falconbridge?” 

44 1 am,” said Lottie, with a slight qorresponding inclina- 
tion of the head. 

44 And I am given to understand that — that he has allowed 
himself to become interested in you!” 

Lottie was silent. She did not feel herself called upon to 
express any opinion, either one way or the other, upon the 
subject. 

44 But you know— or you ought to know, that it will never 
do,” went on Mrs. Falconbridge. 44 1 dare say it is natural 
enough for him to fancy you, because you are pretty ” — Lot- 
tie’s lips dimpled into the least possible smile at this — 4 4 but it 
would be simple ruin for him. ” 

44 Why?” asked Lottie, fixing her grave, dark eyes full on 
the lady’s face. 

44 Why? Because we have entirely another career in view 
for him,” said Mrs. Falconbridge. “Because he belongs to 
altogether a different sphere from you and yours— and be- 
cause he is already engaged.” 


LOTTIE AND VICTOROT. 


1G9 


Lottie looked up quickly. 

44 Already engaged?” 

“ To his cousin, Valencia Eden. Or, at least, if not actu- 
ally engaged, so far committed that any retreat would be base- 
ly dishonorable on his part, and heart-breaking to her.” 

44 He never told me that,” said Lottie. 

44 Of course not. But 1 tell you — and that should be 
enough. Now you will promise me, will you not, that this 
affair shall be abandoned?” she added, changing the tones of 
her voice to a coaxing, conciliatory accent. But Lottie rose. 

44 I will promise nothing,” said she. “ Pray excuse me — I 
am sure I must be wanted back in the office.” 

Mrs. Falconbridge was only half satisfied with the result of 
her diplomacy, and yet she felt that under the circumstances 
she could hardly have done anything more.. 

At four o’clock, the hour at which Lottie was usually com- 
paratively at leisure, Mr. Wallace Falconbridge presented him- 
self as usual at the window. 

44 Are you ready for that walk you promised me, Lottie?” 
he asked, with the greatest coolness. 

Lottie hesitated a moment. 

44 Yes, I am ready,” said she. 

And she got her little hat and walked along by his side un- 
til they had reached a shaded woodland path, secure from all 
intrusion. 

44 Well?” said Wallace, at length. 

44 Well?” said Lottie. 

44 Something is wrong.” 

44 How do you know?” she asked. 

44 By your manner, of course. Ho you know, my dear, that 
you are not an accomplished actress yet? Speak out, Lottie. 
There must be no secrets between us. Has Valencia Eden 
been with you?” 

44 No.” 

44 My mother, then?” 

Lottie burst into tears. 

44 Oh, Wallace, is it true?” she cried, stopping abruptly in 
the middle of the path and looking appealingly up into his 

44 Is what true?” 

44 That you are engaged to your cousin Valencia Eden? 
That, in spite of all your vows and asseverations, I am only 
second in your heart?” 

He looked down at her with grave, set features, and eyes 
full of quivering light. 


170 


LOTTIE AND YICTOKINE. 


“ Is that what they have told you, Lottie?” 

“ That is what they have told me.” 

“ Then it is false! False as hell itself.” 

“ Wallace!” she cried. 

“ This is not a time to choose one’s words,” said the young 
man, bitterly. “ Before Heaven, Lottie, I swear that I love 
you, and you only — that I never have been engaged to any 
woman yet. If any one has told you otherwise, I defy them 
to prove it. Look into my eyes, Lottie, and tell me whether 
you believe me. ” 

“ 1 do believe you, Wallace,” she said, after a brief pause. 

“ God bless you, my own Lottie!” he murmured, drawing 
her close to him. “ And now there remains but one thing 
further for you to say — that you will be my wife — mine for- 
ever — mine beyond the reach of carping tongue or meddling 
hand. Tell me, Lottie, do you love me?” 

44 1 love you, Wallace,” she said, with the innocent wist- 
fulness of a child. 

“ And you will be my wife?” 

'“If you wish it.” 

“ My own little darling!” he whispered, looking down into 
her eyes, and pressing both her hands tenderly in his. “ Tell 
me, dearest, have you never loved any one before?” 

“ No one, Wallace.” 

“ Nor I, either. Oh, my darling, I do not believe that this 
blessed thrill of joy can ever spring uj) twice in the heart. 
It is once and forever. But, Lottie—” 

“ Well?” 

“ I want you now. ” 

“ Do you mean — ” 

“ I mean, dearest, that we must be married at once.” 


CHAPTER XXXI. 

THE WEDDING. 

Lottie Avenel stood looking up at her lover with eyes of 
grave doubt. 

“ I don’t think it is possible, Wallace,” said she. 

“ Aud why not?” he demanded. 

“ What would people say?” 

“ What they please. Why need we care for the howling' cry 
of Mrs. Grundy?” he retorted, contemptuously. 

“ And, besides — ” hesitated Lottie. 

“ Well, let’s have all the objections, and be done with it,” 
said Falconbridge, laughingly. 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


m 


“ 1 haven’t any trousseau,” confessed the young girl. 

“ Oh, hang the trousseau! You can have half a dozen of 
them afterward, if you like.” 

“ And there’s no church nearer than six miles.” 

“ That’s nothing, so long as we have got a minister close at 
hand. ” 

“ But 1 don’t know of any minister,” said Lottie, wrink- 
ling her pretty brows in grave perplexity. 

“ 1 do,” said Falconbridge. “ You are always laughing at 
me, Lottie, for turning over the leaves of the hotel register, 
and now you will perceive the beneficial effects of that habit. 
I saw the name of a clergyman there, only yesterday after- 
noon — the Reverend Aaron Apgood, of Mountsville Four Cor- 
ners, Pennsylvania. Now, why won’t the Reverend Mr. Ap- 
good be as potent to marry us as the Archbishop of Canterbury 
himself?” 

“ But, Wallace,” pleaded Lottie, “ it’s so sudden.” 

“ Not at all sudden,” said the young man, reassuringly. 
“ All these things are done in a hurry at the last. And, my 
darling, I never can feel quite easy until you are mine, both 
by the laws of God and man. You have owned that you love 
me.” 

“I do love you, Wallace,” she whispered, answering the 
mute question of his eyes. 

“ Then give yourself to me. Believe in me, dearest, and as 
Heaven is my witness, I will never give you cause to regret 
the precious gift. May I go to Mr. Apgood?” 

“ Yes,” said Lottie, after a little hesitation, “you may go 
to him.” 

Mrs. Falconbridge had gone up from her interview with 
Lottie Avenel, not altogether satisfied in her mind. Lottie 
was far lovelier, far more self-possessed, far • more upon an 
equality with herself than she had expected, and consequently 
Wallace’s immediate danger was, in her maternal mind, great** 
ly magnified. Valencia started up from the sofa where she 
was lying, face downward, when her adopted aunt entered. 

“ Well,” she cried, “ have you seen her?” 

“ Yes,” said Mrs. Falconbridge, slowly. 

“ And has she promised to give him up?” 

Mrs. Falconbridge shook her head. 

“ 1 fear we have underrated her influence over him,” said 
she, sadly. “ She will come to no definite terms, and I think 
it is our best policy to leave the Folliott Mountain House at 
once. ” 

“ And where shall we go?” 


172 LOTTIE AND ViCTOIUNft 

“ To Martha’s Vineyard — Mount Desert Island — I don't 
know nor care where, so that Wallace is removed from this 
great danger. ” 

“ Pretty girls are everywhere/’ said Valencia, a little dis- 
dainfully. 

“ Yes, but not such girls as this. Call Elise and Florine at 
once. ” 

“ Have you spoken to my uncle?” 

“Yes.” 

“ And he — what does he say?” 

“ He is shocked beyofid all measure; he declares it is im- 
possible. So I would have said, myself, twenty-four hours 
ago,” added Mrs. Falconbridge, sadly; “ but the world seems 
to have turned itself entirely upside down since then. Ho 
quite agrees with me as to the necessity of immediately chang- 
ing our quarters. Let them pack as much as possible to- 
night, for we shall take the morning train. ” 

“ But will Wallace consent to accompany us?” hesitated 
Valencia. 

“ Of course he will. How can he refuse when he sees that 
our minds are irrevocably made up?” retorted Mrs. Falcon- 
bridge. 

And the French maids were summoned immediately to be- 
gin their task. 

* * * * Sis.* * 

The Reverend Aaron Apgood was in his own room, smok- 
ing a very bad cigar and meditating very gloomily over his 
prospects. Mr. Apgood was on his summer vacation, and, 
unfortunately, had stayed a little too long among the White 
Mountains. 

“ I didn’t suppose that two days in the Franconia Notch 
would have made so much difference,” said Mr. Apgood, dis- 
consolately eying his little leather- covered account-book. 
“ Confound ’em all! what do they mean by charging such 
prodigious bills everywhere? And now I haven’t enough 
money left to take me home, and I must wait here until I 
write to Mrs. Apgood for some of the housekeeping money. 
I know what she’ll say well enough. 1 sha’n’t hear the last 
of it for six months to come; but really I don’t see that I’ve 
been so much to blame. A man doesn’t get to the White 
Mountains every day, and it’s a pity not to see all the sights 
while one is here. But then, how the bills will roll up while 
1 am waiting here!” 

Mr. Apgood took out his attenuated purse, and counted its 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 173 

contents over and over again, each time apparently deriving 
less consolation from that financial operation. 

“ Seven dollars and seventy-five cents!” he said, do- 
lorously. “ And I can’t reach home short of fourteen — 
and I don’t know a soul to borrow of in this place. Yes, the 
only thing to do is to wait here until Mrs. A. can remit 
funds — to wait here at four dollars and a half a day, with the 
pulpit unprovided for next Sunday, and everything in general 
going to the dogs.” 

And Mr. Apgood smote his forehead with an aspect of tragic 
despair. 

“ Tap-tap-tap-a-tap!” came a little tattoo at the outside of 
his door just then. 

‘ 4 It is the bill,” said Mr. Apgood to himself. “ And what 
I’m going to say to ’em 1 don’t know. Come in.” 

It was a servant, but, to Mr. Apgood’s infinite relief, he 
had no folded missive in his hand. 

“Mr. Apgood?” said the servant. 

“ The same,” said the reverend gentleman, giving one end 
of his white cravat a pull. 

“ If you please, sir, Mr. Faleonbridge presents his compli- 
ments — ” 

“ Who?” demanded Mr. Apgood. 

“Mr. Faleonbridge.” 

“ I have not — ahem — the honor of his acquaintance,” said 
the clergyman, feeling his chin. 

“ No, sir? But Mr. Faleonbridge presents his compliments, 
sir, all the same, and hopes you will make it convenient to 
step down in the parlor for a few minutes.” 

“Hum!” said Mr. Apgood. “ It isn’t any relation of the 
landlord, is it?” 

“ No, sir,” assured the waiter. 

Once again Mr. Apgood was perceptibly relieved. 

“ Pray return my best respects to Mr. Faleonbridge, who- 
ever he may be,” said he, “ and tell him I will be with him 
presently.” 

When the man vvas gone he brushed his hair, tied on a clean 
neckcloth, and viewed himself critically in the glass. 

“ I haven’t the least idea who this gentleman is,” said he 
to himself. “Perhaps it is some one spiritually ill at ease 
who requires the consolatory advice of a clergyman — perhaps 
it is a reader of ‘ Philosophical Theories ’ ” (Mr. Apgood was 
an author in a small way, and had published one or two un- 
pretending pamphlets, it is needless to add at his own ex- 
pense), “ who may desire to make my acquaintance.” 


174 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


And so, not without a modest thrill of pride, the Reverend 
Mr. Apgood walked down-stairs, momentarily forgetful of his 
monetary difficulties. 

But there was no dyspeptic unbeliever; no theological book- 
worm awaiting him in the great hotel parlor, where the huge, 
gold-framed mirrors reflected the scrolls and arabesques of the 
carpet, the stiff upholstered chairs, and the marble-topped 
tables scattered here and there, but a tall, handsome young 
gentleman with a blonde complexion, curling hair of chest- 
nut, and merry blue eyes — a gentleman dressed in the very 
extreme of the fashion, whose glistening garments made the 
poor clergyman feel painfully conscious of his own shabby and 
threadbare outer man. 

“ Mr. Apgood?” said Wallace Falconbridge, advancing 
with a courteous bow. 

“Mr. Apgood, sir, at your service,” bowed the shabby- 
genteel boarder at the Folliott Mountain House. 

“ You are a clergyman, I believe?” 

“ I am, sir, a clergyman of the Baptist denomination.” 

“ Pm not at all particular about the denomination,” said 
Wallace. “ 1 want you to marry me.” 

“ To—” 

“ To marry me, sir,” said the young man, slightly raising 
his voice, as if under the apprehension that Mr. Apgood was 
deaf. “ To perform the marriage ceremony, 1 mean.” 

“ I shall be happy to be of use, I am sure,” said Mr. Ap- 
good, his face brightening as he rubbed his hands and per- 
formed a mental operation in arithmetic. “ He can’t pay me 
less than ten dollars — perhaps twenty — and that will set me 
all right with the hotel bill and traveling expenses.” 

Thus cogitating, he was in nowise abashed at the entrance 
of Mr. Hampshire, the landlord, accompanied by his wife, a 
cozy little old lady, in rustling black grenadine, and a cap 
quivering with artificial pink roses, Mr. Elfield and the pretty 
telegraph operator with them. 

“ We’re going to have an impromptu wedding here, sir, you 
see,” said Mr. Hampshire, nodding cheerily toward the 
clergyman. “This is Miss Avenel, the bride. I give her 
away; my wife and Mr. Elfield are the witnesses — and, hey, 
presto! a married couple appear on the scene. It’s quite like 
the stage, upon my word!” 

Mr. Apgood bowed stiffly — he did not quite know whether 
any allusion to the stage was quite allowable under the cir- 
cumstances. 

“Are you ready?” he asked, clearing his throat. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


175 


“Ready? Of course we're ready," said Wallace, drawing 
Lottie's arm reassuringly under his own. “ We've been ready 
these fifteen minutes." 

“Shall I, then — ahem-^proceed?" questioned the clergy- 
man. 

“ I don't see that you can do anything better," said Wal- 
lace. 

“ I did not know," said Mr. Apgood, rather severely, “ but 
that you would like a few minutes in which to think over the 
important and sacred relation on which — " 

“ Think," interrupted Wallace Falconbridge, rather impa- 
tiently, “ I've done all the thinking 1 need upon the subject. 
Haven't you, Lottie?" 

“ Wallace!" remonstrated Lottie, in a reproving whisper. 

“ Go on, if you please," said Mr. Falconbridge, giving Lot- 
tie's arm a little affectionate squeeze. “We are quite ready." 

And Mr. Apgood went on, accordingly, making Wallace 
Falconbridge and Charlotte Avenel one, with all the speed 
that was consistent with his clerical dignity and the impor- 
tance of the occasion. 

Lottie trembled and turned alternately pale and red, half 
frightened at what she was doing, half uncertain whether it 
was not best to retreat at the last moment and say “ no " 
where the service demanded a “yes." But she didn't, and 
consequently she found herself transformed into Mrs. Falcon- 
bridge in about five minutes. 

“ Is that all?" said the bridegroom, as Mr. Apgood paused. 

“ That, sir, is all," said Mr. Apgood, impressively. “ Al- 
low me to congratulate you, sir, and you, madame." 

Lottie scarcely knew whom he meant by the magniloquent 
address; but she murmured something, she scarcely knew 
what, as Mrs. Hampshire kindly kissed her, and the jovial 
landlord advanced to claim his share. 

“ Much obliged to you, sir," said Wallace. “ What do you 
charge?" 

“I — 1 have no regulated remuneration," said the clergy- 
man, a little flurried. 

“ All right," said Wallace. “ Then I must regulate it for 
you." 

He took anew, crisj) bank-bill from his pocket and tendered 
it to the clergyman. Mr. Apgood stepped back. 

“ I think, sir, you have made a mistake," said he. 

“ How a mistake? Is it not enough?" brusquely demanded 
Mr. Falconbridge. 


176 


LOTTIE AND VICTOR INE. 


/ 

“ This is a hundred-dollar bill. I — I think you supposed 
it to be a ten?” 

“ I supposed it to be precisely what it is, sir,” said Wallace, 
bowing. “ Pray accept it, such as it is.” 

Mr. Apgood sped back to his room on the wings of the 
wind, settled his hotel bill, fee’d the waiters liberally, and 
took the evening train for Mountsville Four Corners, in the 
State of Pennyslvania. 

“ It's an ill wind that blows nobody any good,” said the 
Reverend Aaron Apgood. 


CHAPTER XXXII. 

THE PARTING. 

“Who is that knocking, Florine? Go to the door and say 
that we can not see any one just now,” said Mrs. Falcon- 
bridge, a little impatiently. 

She was sitting on a low sofa, directing the packing of her 
dresses, while Elise, the elder French maid, performed the 
part of hands to her head. Florine was emptying the bureau 
drawers and wardrobes, and piling their contents on the bed, 
while Valencia was on her knees in front of a prodigious square 
trunk. Both looked tired and overheated, and the room was 
forlorn enough in its general aspect of turmoil and disorder. 

“IPs Mr. Wallace, madame,” said Florine, tiptoeing her 
way back over bonnets, scarfs, piles of pasteboard boxes, and 
pyramids of fluted laces and muslins. 

“ I may come in, mayn’t I, mother?” said Wallace. 
“ What a scene of confusion you have here, to be sure!” 

Mrs. Palconbridge’s brow brightened a little. 

“ Yes, you may come in,” said she. “ If you can get in, 
that is.” 

“ Packing, eh?” said Wallace. “ I say, Val,” to his cous- 
in, who rose to her feet at his approach, laughing and a little 
discomfited, “ you could get into that huge trunk yourself, 
like the girl in the poem — what was her name? — who* hid her- 
self on her wedding-day, and turned into a skeleton.” 

Valencia smiled; she, as well as Mrs. Falconbridge, was 
cheered and gratified to see that the young man was in a good 
humor. 

“ Yes, we are packing,” said she. m 

“ And may 1 ask the meaning of this sudden maneuver?” 

“We are going tp leave the Mountain House,” said his 
mother, coloring. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORIES. 


177 


“ Are you? Florine, will you just step out and ask Felix 
to put up my things, too? Tell him to lose no time. And 
where are you going?” 

“We are talking of Mount Desert Island,” said Mrs. Fal- 
conbridge, still with that conscious air of embarrassment about 
her of which she could not divest herself, let her strive as she 
would. “ Your father finds that the air of the White Mount- 
ains is too stimulating for him, and — and — ” 

“ Out with it,” said Wallace, laughing. “ There's some- 
thing else behind. Remember that an open confession is good 
for the soul. ” 

“And we all think, my son,” added Mrs. Falconbridge, 
taking advantage of the opportune moment in which both 
maids chanced to be absent from the room — Florine on her 
errand to Felix, the valet, and Elise in search of a certain 
blue muslin polonaise which had not been returned from the 
hotel laundry — “ that it is perhaps best — pardon a mother's 
solicitude — that you should be removed from the dangerous 
proximity of — of that pretty girl in the telegraph office down- 
stairs.” 

“ You think so, eh?” said Wallace, coldly. 

“ Can you blame me, Wallace?” appealed Mrs. Falcon- 
bridge. “ The temptation is great- — the consequences may be 
such as you will rue all your life long. Oh, my son, my son, 
if you will not think for yourself, we must think for you.” 

“ I am infinitely obliged to you for your care, mother,” 
said the young man, “ but there is one thing which you all 
seem to forget — that 1 am no longer a child in leading-strings. ” 

“ But you will go with us, Wallace?” pleaded the mother, 
with clasped hands and wistful,, upraised eyes. 

“ 1 shall leave the place, mother, but not with you. In- 
stead of going to Mount Desert Island, I shall return, for the 
present, to Montreal, with my wife.” 

“ With your wife , Wallace?” almost shrieked Mrs. Falcon- 
bridge. 

“ Yes. I was married to Miss Avenel half an hour ago.” 

Mrs. Falconbridge sunk back on the sofa, with a burst of 
hysterical tears and sobs; Valencia Eden stood opposite, cold 
and pale as a marble statue. In all her vague fears and dread 
she had anticipated nothing so terrible as this. The blow had 
fallen at last, and poor Valencia was well-nigh stunned by its 
violence and suddenness. 

Wallace turned and left the room. On the stairs he met 
Elise. 


178 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“ Elise,” said he, “go to my mother at once; she is not 
well. Do you know where my father is?” 

“ In his own room, monsieur. His gout is troubling him 
to-day.” 

Wallace bit his lip. On his gouty days Mr. Falconbridge, 
senior, was very uncertain indeed in his temper, though genial 
and sunny enough, as a general thing. 

“ There’s no retreat left for me, however,” said he to him- 
self. “ 1 must face the danger, and get it over as quickly as 
possible. And one of Lottie’s smiles is worth it all.” 

For, as will easily be perceived, our young bridegroom of an 
hour was very much in love indeed. 

“ Come in,” growled Mr. Falconbridge, as his son knocked 
at the door. “ What made you disturb me just now, Wally? 
I was two thirds asleep, and it’s so confoundedly difficult for- 
me to lose myself, with this pain grinding through all my 
joints.” 

“ I’m sorry to disturb you, sir,” said the young man, “ but 
it is on a question of pressing importance.” 

“ What is it?” demanded the old gentleman. 

“Iam married, sir.” 

“ Married!” Mr. Falconbridge sat upright on his sofa, and 
made a clutch at his eye-glasses. “ What the deuce do you 
mean, Wally, by joking like this, when I’m half sick?” 

“ I am not joking, father; I am in earnest. I was married 
half an hour ago to Miss Avenel. ” 

“ What! the little black-eyed telegraph girl?” 

“ Exactly — to the little black-eyed telegraph girl.” 

“ Wallace,” said Mr. Falconbridge, his brow clouded over, 
“ you are a fool!” 

“ There is where I venture to differ from you, sir,” said 
Wallace, preserving his temper Vith admirable equanimity. 

“ If you have really done this thing, sir — ” 

“ I assure you, my dear father, that I have spoken only the 
plain, unvarnished truth,” interrupted Wallace. 

“ Well, sir, you must take the consequences of it.” 

“I am prepared for that, father,” responded the young 
man. 

“You are, eh? All right, then. I’ve nothing more to say 
— except that you may consider yourself disinherited.” 

The young man advanced a step or two toward the sofa. 

“ Father,” said he, “ you know very well that this is not a 
mere question of money. I have enough of my own to live 
comfortably upon, and even were it not so, I hope that many 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 179 

long years may elapse before I fall heir to your property. 
But I don't like to have you angry with me." 

“ Then why do you go deliberately to work to incur my 
anger?" demanded Mr. Falconbridge, flushing to the very 
roots of his silver hair. 

“ Because, sir, I think that on a subject like this one must 
be guided by one's own heart, and that alone." 

“ Very good," said Mr. Falconb ridge, gruffly. “ If that 
is your theory, why, then, you had better stick to it. I really 
don't see why you should have done me the compliment of 
mentioning the matter to me at all. I hope you will be 
pleased with your new toy; but have the goodness to remem- 
ber that I shall have nothing more to say to you. ” 

“ Have I ever disobeyed you before, lather?" 

“ N-no — not that I can remember. But that in no degree 
palliates your present fault. Good heavens! you, who might 
have married whom you pleased, to stoop to— a telegraph 
girl! Wallace, you've ruined yourself!" roared the old gen- 
tleman. 

Wallace Falconbridge colored. 

“It is quite useless for us to discuss the subject, sir," he 
said, -constrainedly. “We are as wide apart in our opinions 
as the poles. I have married a sweet and lovely girl because 
I love her, nor will any amount of argument induce me to re- 
pent the step I have taken. From here I am going to Mon- 
treal. You will, I suppose, travel in quite a different direc- 
tion. Can we not part kindly?" 

Mr. Falconbridge looked coldly up. 

“ I wish you well, 1 am sure," he said — “ as I would wish 
any other acquaintance well." 

“ Is that the only light in which you can regard me, sir?" 
asked Wallace, deeply pained and chagrined. 

“ You have yourself drawn the line of demarkation, sir," 
retorted the old gentleman. 

“ May I not bring my wife to you to receive a father's bless- 
ing?" earnestly pleaded the young husband. 

“By no means!" answered Mr. Falconbridge, with 
acerbity. “ I decline absolutely and definitely to receive her." 

“ Good-bye, then," said Wallace, slowly and sadly. 

“ Good-bye," answered Mr. Falconbridge, affecting to be 
deeply interested in the editorial columns of the paper. 

And thus he parted from his only son. 

Mrs. Falconbridge and Miss Eden were equally determined 
not to countenance Wallace's young wife in any manner what- 
soever, and they kept their own room until the evening train 


180 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


for Montreal had gone, lest by any accident they should come 
in contact with the late Miss Avenel. 

“ It’s like a frightful dream/’ said Mrs. Falconbridge, lying 
on the sofa, while Elise dabbed her face with a handkerchief 
dipped in Cologne, and held a gold-stoppered smelling-bottle 
to her nostrils. “ My son married and gone away from me — 
and married to such a creature! Oh, Valencia, what shall I 
do? There is nothing — absolutely nothing left for me to live 
for. Oh, what shall I do?” 

“Do as I intend to do,” said Valencia Eden, coldly. 
“Forget him.” 

“You are not his mother.” 

“ Do you think,” cried out Valencia, “ that 1 did not love 
him? Oh, Aunt Marian, the world seems all a gulf of black- 
ness to me now,” with a low wail. “But I am too proud to 
let him see that I have been crushed. I shall live on, in order 
that I may one day be revenged on her /” 

“ Valencia!” cried the horrified old lady. 

“ I mean it,” said Valencia, with pallid face and set lips. 
And at that moment Mrs. Falconbridge was almost afraid of 
the girl. 


CHAPTER XXXIII. 

“bachelor’s hall.” 

Montreal once again! Old, antique Montreal, with the 
green mountain holding it, as it were, in a tender embrace, 
and the blue, flashing waters of the St. Lawrence belting it 
with sunshine. Lottie Falconbridge— how strange and sweet 
her name sounded to her now, when, by chance, any one spoke 
it — could just remember it, as she had seen it when a child — 
the narrow streets where she and Victorine had wandered, 
forlorn, solitary little strangers — the quays, where French 
sailors shouted to one another in a language so unfamiliar — 
the statue of Nelson towering high above the houses in Tra- 
falgar Square — the twin towers of Notre Dame, and the nar- 
row foot-walks, so unlike all more southern cities. As Lottie 
recalled those days of her girlhood, she felt as if she had en- 
tered into a different sphere. It surely could not be possible 
that the little desolate child, who had sat and swung her feet 
on the wooden benches in Victoria Square, listening to the 
splash of the fountain, and dreading to go home to the dreary 
lodgings that were one degree less endurable than the bleak 
October twilights without, could have anything in common 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 181 

with the happy young bride, driving through the streets in 
silks and jewels, with Tier proud husband by her side. 

“ I was such a forlorn little child,” said she, looking smil- 
ingly into Wallace's face; “but I am, oh, so immeasurably 
happy now! I could almost cry when I remember the poor 
little chilled, blue-nosed Lottie of those days!” 

“ And you are quite sure you are happy now, Lottie?” he 
questioned. 

“ Quite, dearest,” she answered, softly. 

“ You don't regret our impromptu marriage in the parlor 
of the Folliott Mountain House?” 

“ Regret it , Wallace?” 

He pressed her hand tenderly. 

“ Dear old Montreal,” he said, looking half sadly at the 
cathedral towers tipped with the level August sunlight. “ I'm 
almost sorry we are going to-morrow. I shall never forget 
these our honey-moon days. ” 

“ But think of the beautiful sail up the St. Lawrence, Wal- 
lace. How we shall enjoy it.” 

“ You are such a sunbeam, ma petite , that you enjoy every- 
thing. Yes, it will be a treat. You don't sketch, do you?” 

Lottie shook her head, laughing. 

‘ 4 Please to remember, sir, that I am not an accomplished 
young person,” said she. 

“ I'm glad of that,” said Wallace, gravely. “ I hate 
sketching young ladies. We'll talk and we'll read, and you 
shall go to sleep with your head on my shoulder.” 

“ And then,” retorted Lottie, with sparkling eyes, “ people 
will be sure to find out that we are a newly married couple.” 

“ Let 'em, then,” said Wallace, composedly. “ I’ve no 
objection to their drawing any inferences they please. I tell 
you what, Lottie, I feel just like a boy let out from school for 
a midsummer holiday, and I mean to enjoy it.” 

“Do you?” 

“ And you?” 

“ I don't quite know how I do feel,” said Lottie, smiling. 
“ It is all so new, and so strange, and so delightful. Wallace, 
are you sure you will always love me as dearly as you do 
now?” 

“What a question for a week-old bride!” retorted he, 
laughing. “ Have you begun to doubt me already?” 

“ No, dearest, not that. But,” said Lottie, speaking slow- 
ly, and with an evident effort, “ all this sunshine of happiness 
—this morning-tide of love that we are enjoying now, will 


m 


LOTTIE AND VICTOKUSTE. 


only make us more wretched, if — if ever we should be es- 
tranged.” 

“ * Tis better to liave loved and lost 
Than never to have loved at all,’ ” 

gayly quoted Falconbridge. “ My dear little wife, you are 
indulging in impossibilities now. Here we are at the hotel 
door. Let’s go in to supper and postpone the ideal for the 
real.” 

And that evening Lottie wrote to Vic tori ne — a long, long 
letter full of her new love and happiness. 

“ It is so strange,” she wrote, “to be married. We used 
to read about it, dear, in our old paper-covered novels, and 
try to fancy what Love really was. But our ideal fell as far 
short of the reality as the pale stars differ from the golden 
noontide sunshine. It is so sweet to feel that you are all in 
all to one loving heart — to look into tender eyes and see your 
own thoughts and fancies mirrored there— to know that all 
the time some one is planning and thinking for you, treasur- 
ing you in his,strong, loyal heart with a love that is exhaust- 
less. You can not comprehend these rhapsodies of mine, dear 
Vic, because your inheritance is not yet come — but the time 
will arrive, sooner or later, when you will understand, fully 
and completely, what all this means.” 

(Alas! how Victorine Avenel’s heart ached as she read the 
words Lottie had written in her new-born glow of happiness. 
Comprehend it! Had she not, too, felt all these things? Had 
she not dreamed, for a short, brief while, that she was first 
and foremost in Oliver St. Charles’s heart? And was not her 
little bark wrecked, hopelessly and forever, on the reefs of 
trial and misery? To her, every one of Lottie’s innocent 
words seemed like a knife, piercing through her very soul. ) 

“ To-morrow,” wrote on Lottie, “ we are going up the St. 
Lawrence, for a brief sojourn among the Thousand Islands; 
and then we shall probably come to New York, by way of 
Niagara Falls, to settle there for the fall and winter. I am 
to have a house of my own, and then, dearest Victorine, you 
must come and be my most honored guest. How we shall 
enjoy it! How much we shall have to tell each other! And, a 
darling, I don’t want you to be jealous because I love Wallace 
so dearly. You are as much to me as you ever were — the two 
loves don’t in the least conflict. And I want you to love 
Wallace, too, for he is the best, and noblest, and dearest of 
created beings.” 

She half smiled to herself as she read over what she had 
written. 


LOTTIE AK1) VICTOKINE. 


183 


“ Victorine will think I am mad,” said she. “ But never 
mind — let; it go. She will comprehend the truth and reality 
of it all when she, too, has entered into the divine arcana of 
Love.” 

The “ Dominican,” upon which Mr. and Mrs. Falconbridge 
took passage for. the Thousand Islands, was a clumsy and old- 
fashioned steamer, cramped in her accommodations, dingy as 
to paint and gilding, and smelling generally, as regarded her 
cabins, of rats and roaches, but the young lovers took small 
heed of that. They were, as yet, too happy in themselves to 
pay much attention to outer circumstances. 

They had scarcely steamed out of sight of Montreal when 
a gentleman, passing them to secure a more comfortable seat 
near the guards, chanced, accidentally, to hit the brim of Mr. 
Falconbridge's hat with his umbrella. 

“ I beg a thousand pardons,” he said, lifting his own hat. 

“ One will do, Gerald Maury,” said Falconbridge, gravely. 

“ Wallace Falconbridge!” exclaimed the other. 

“ The same.” 

“ Old fellow,” cried the stranger, showing a very handsome 
set of teeth under the shadow of an ink-black mustache, and 
seizing Falconbridge's -hand in both of his, “I am delighted 
to see you! Going up the river?” 

“ Yes,” said Falconbridge. “ Let mo introduce you to my 
wife. Mr. Maury— Mrs. Falconbridge.” 

Gerald Maury stared. 

“ Your wife?” 

“Yes, my wife.” 

“ But I didn't know you were married. Excuse me, Mrs. 
Falconbridge,” with a puzzled sort of bow to Lottie, “but 
all this takes me so entirely by surprise.” 

“ It is rather surprising, isn't it?” said Falconbridge, 
laughing. “ I don't think I am quite used to it myself, as 
yet. To tell you the truth, we have only been married a 
week.” 

“ Shall I interfere with your honey-moon hajipiness if I scat 
myself here beside you?” asked Maury. 

“ Not in the least. We are not selfish,” laughed Falcon- 
bridge. 

Gerald Maury, a distant relative of the Falconbridge family, 
and an intimate college friend of Wallace himself, was one of 
those fortunate individuals who are placed beyond penury by 
a certain annual income, and who have nothing to do but to 
enjoy themselves. He was traveling because it was the proper 
thing to do; he was drifting up the St. Lawrence because the 


184 


LOTTIE AtfD VICTOR IN E. 


tide of tourists chanced to set most strongly that way; and he 
was perfectly delighted to fall in with friends like the Falcon- 
bridges. There was something genial and winning about him 
— something unconsciously attractive in the soft light of his 
pleasant dark eye, the artistic bushy beard that he wore, and 
the cheery tone of his voice. 

“ I do like him so much, Wallace,” said Lottie to her hus- 
band, when Maury had gone to the other deck to smoke a 
cigar with a party of Canadians with whom he chanced to be 
in company. 

“ Everybody likes him. He’s the best fellow in the world,” 
said Wallace, enthusiastically. “I call it a piece of good 
luck that we’ve happened to meet him. He keeps a yacht at 
the Thousand Islands — in fact, he owns an island — and spends 
part of his time there and part at the hotel. I’ve promised 
to take you over to his island, picnicking, Lottie.” 

“ I’m glad of it,” said Lottie. “ I know I shall enjoy it.” 

“ Well, Maury, and what do you think of her?” asked Fal- 
conbridge, when his friend had rejoined him, and Lottie was 
in her state-room, brushing out her curls and arranging the 
bows of her hat for dinner. 

“ I think she is one of the loveliest little creatures I ever 
saw in my life,” said Maury. “ I congratulate you, Wally. 
Where did you find her? How did you induce her to have 
you? Tell me all about it. I shall be tempted to believe that 
it is a dream.” 

And then Wallace Falconbridge related the whole story of 
how he had fallen in love at first sight with the beautiful 
young telegraph operator at the Folliott Mountain House, 
and how he had married her in spite of all 0]3position. 

“ By Jove!” cried Maury, taking long pulls at his cigar, 
and looking admiringly at his friend, “ it sounds like a chap- 
ter out of a novel. It’s a romance in real life, with a venge- 
ance.” 

“ I don’t know that I should tell the story to every one,” 
said Falconbridge. “ But you can comprehend both it and 
me, Gerald. She’s a queen among women — a lady that would 
grace auy circle of society, and I am daily more convinced of 
my exceeding good fortune in winning her to be my wife. ” 

And when Lottie came back Gerald Maury rose and offered 
her his seat with as reverential an air as if she had been a 
princess. 

That was the auspicious beginning of a friendship that 
afforded much happiness to all three of the young people. In 
the soft sunset of the evening they landed at the Clissmond 





LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


185 


House, in one of the prettiest bays of the Thousand Islands, 
and spent the evening wandering on the shores by moonlight. 
The next day they were rowed by a one-legged old boatman, 
who seemed to have sprung up in the pine woods as spontane- 
ously as the mushrooms and ferns, across a lovely expanse of 
clear, green water, to a little island, where a one-storied cot- 
tage, surrounded by verandas, contained all the requisites for 
a luxurious bachelor life. The floors were covered with white 
matting, the lounges and sofas, curtains and lambrequins, 
were of pink chintz, and the bamboo chairs were all con- 



There were plenty of books and newspapers, a cottage piano, 
and a billiard-t^ble, and two or three colored servants kept 
everything in the daintiest order. 

“ The name of this island is Bachelors Hall,” said Ger- 
ald Maury, laughing, “ but that is no reason why I shouldn't 
entertain my married friends here. ” 

“None in the world,” said Lottie, gravely. “ And will 
you teach me to fish, and to play billiards, and to do every- 
thing that is the fashion here?” 

She was as happy as a child, wandering around the hem- 
lock-shaded groves, throwing stones into the crystal-clear water 
that lapped the shores with murmurous melody, playing with 
the huge old Newfoundland dog, and presiding at the table, 
which Maury had contrived, by some mysterious understand- 
ing with the hotel keepers, to cover with every luxury. 

“My first housekeeping,” said she. “ You mustn't be 
surprised if I am a little awkward at first, Gerald and Wal- 
lace. But just wait until I am in my New York house.” 

“ Gerald has promised to make us a long visit as soon as 
we are settled,” said Wallace, looking proudly at his beautiful 
young wife, while Gerald Maury, sitting opposite, thought 
within himself: 

“ By Jove!” his favorite invocation, “ if 1 had chanced to 
meet a girl like that, I wouldn't be the lord of Bachelor's 
Hall now!” 

The next day, when he rowed over to St. Salvador Bay for 
the morning papers, he found the hotel crowded with a new 
relay of excursionists, several of whom were personal friends 
iv' of his own. 

“ Halloo, Maury!” called out a long- whiskered exquisite in 
a suit of dove color that might have been lifted bodily out of 
a Broadway shop-window, “ so you're here, eh? Going to 
invite us all over to the island?” 


186 


LOTTIE AND Y1CT0RINE. 


“Can’t just at present/’ said Maury. “Got company 
there.” 

“ Who?” 

“Mr. and Mrs. Falconbridge.” 

“ Hal-\ oo !” said Mr. Mortimer Ellsley. “ Is it Wally and 
his pretty telegraph girl?” 

“What! have you heard about it?” sharply demanded 
Maury. 

“ Stopped at the Folliott Mountain House, and heard the' 
whole story,” said Mr. Ellsley, with a knowing wink of the 
left eye. “ Is she really so pretty?” 

“ Mrs. Wallace Falconbridge is one of the most beautiful 
women, as well as the most perfect lady I have ever seen,” 
said Maury, coldly. 

“ Don’t say so,” said Ellsley. “ So she’s conquered you, 
eh? A regulardittle fascinator she must be. Will you intro- 
duce us if we row over?” 

“ It is the province of Mr. Falconbridge to introduce to his 
wife such acquaintances as he may deem worthy of the 
honor,” said Maury. 

“ You’re as stiff as a pike-staff,” said Mr. Ellsley, in com- 
plaining accents. “However, we’ll paddle over, Nixon, and 
Dumereau, and I, the first chance we get. I suppose your 
champagne cellar holds out good?” 

“ Pretty well, for that,” said Maury, rather reluctantly. 
“ But you will have to excuse me just at present. I must go 
to the Clissmond House at once for the letters and papers. 
Confusion seize those gossiping fools!” he quoth, indignantly, 
to himself, as he strode away. “ If they’re going to wag their 
tongues in this way. poor Mrs. Falconbridge will be a sort of 
raree show for the whole place in a week. ” 

The mails waiting for them at the office of the Clissmond 
House were not very extensive— -a few papers and letters for 
Mr. Maury, and one yellow-enveloped telegram directed to 




“ Wallace Falconbridge, 


Clissmond House.” 


“ St. Salvador Bay, 

“ N. Y. 


“ Halloo!” said Mr. Maury, as he turned it upside down, 
and downside up, “ what’s happened now? There’s always 
trouble brewing when these yellow- jacketed fellows come buz- 
zing about one’s ears, like epistolary hornets. Well, there 
must be an end to all things ; and I was thinking, only yester- 


life*: i-v '-v . 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


187 


day, that poor Wally was almost too happy to have it last. I 
won’t stay here fooling with those fellows— I’ll take the tele- 
gram over to Falconbridge. I wonder what is in it, anyhow?” 

And the boatman was rather astounded to see how quickly 
his master returned to be rowed back to Bachelor’s Hall. 


CHAPTER XXXIV. 

THE FIRST PARTING. 

Bachelor’s Hall had never looked so lovely as it did 
in the blue noontide of the late August day, as Gerald Maury 
approached it in the little row-boat, a light and symmetrical 
craft which shot along through the diamond-clear waters of 
the St. Lawrence, propelled by the one-legged boatman, who, 
seeing that his master was in no humor for conversation, 
whistled softly to himself as he plied the even strokes of the 
oar. Dark against the vivid sapphire of the heavens stood the 
clustering pines; a United States flag floated from the top of 
the house — and through the foliage which shaded the wide 
veranda Maury could just catch sight of Lottie Falconb ridge’s 
white dress, as she sat there caressing the silken head of the 
big dog, while her husband, lazily reclining on a hammock, 
dreamed over the pages of a newly cut magazine. The Lotos 
Eaters of Tennyson’s poem could hardly have lived a more 
picturesque or dreamy life. 

The dog rushed barking down the gentle declivity as the 
keel of the boat grated on the pebbly landing-spot; Falcon- 
bridge sprung from the hammock, and Lottie followed him 
down the path. 

“ Back again, old fellow?” cried Wallace. “ Well, what 
news?” 

44 News of some kind,” said Maury, doffing his broad straw 
hat to Mrs. Falconbridge, as she stood under the trees, look- 
ing as lovely as a nymph, in the shifting lights and shadows 
of the boughs; 44 but whether good or bad I hardly know. 
Here is the telegram— judge for yourself.” 

44 A telegram!” cried Lottie, clinging to her husband’s 
arm. 44 Oh, Wallace, I hope nothing has happened!” 

Falconbridge made no reply, but hurriedly tore the buff 
envelope open. Its contents were brief. 

44 Your father is dying. Come at once if you would see 
him alive. * Marian Falconbridge.” 

Wallace’s face turned of a deathly paleness — he leaned up 
against the nearest tree for support. 


188 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“ Oh, Wallace, what is it?” eagerly questioned his wife, 
lie held out the folded paper to her, with a sickly attempt at 
a smile. 

“ Don’t be frightened, Lottie,” said he. “ I— I dare say 
the danger is exaggerated. It came so suddenly, you see, that 
it almost, upset me. But I must go at once.” 

Lottie stood looking at him with quivering lips, and a face 
as pale as his own. The sunshine of the perfect summer day 
sifted down upon her through the murmurous green of the 
gigantic pine boughs overhead— the ripple of the river made 
music at her feet— and yet, at that instant, she felt as if a 
death blow bad fallen upon her new heritage of happiness. 

“ And I, Wallace — I may go, too? We are not to be 
parted?” 

He shook his head. 

“ No, Lottie— no, sweetheart,” he answered, stroking her 
dark curls with a tender touch. “ I must travel night and 
day, and it would be hard for you. Better remain here until 
I return— it will be but a day or two.” 

Lottie bowed her head in mute, heart-stricken acquiescence. 
She knew that there was yet another reason, which her hus- 
band did not speak — that he was not certain that his parents 
would consent to receive his wife. Her name was not men- 
tioned in the telegram — and at such a moment as this, Wal- 
lace Falconb ridge felt that he could not bring any discordant 
element into the home where his father lay at the point of 
death. 

“ You will stay, Lottie?” he asked. 

“ If you wish it, Wallace.” 

“ It will be better, dearest. My God! how sudden all this 
is!” 

And, like a flash, the memory came back to Wallace Fal- 
conbridge of the almost unvarying kindness and affection of 
his father, and the poor return that he had too often made for 
it. And, like so many others, when the dark tides of Death 
are drifting their loved ones away from them, he felt that he 
would have given all that he had in the world to recall the 
past and mold it over again. 

“ Maury,” he said to his friend, “ you will take care of 
Lottie. Take her back to the Clissmond House, and see to 
her while I am gone. How lucky that you are here!” 

“ All right, old fellow,” said Maury, huskily. “ But I 
hope you’ll find there is no such immediate danger when you 
reach Boston.” 

“ I fear there is no hope of that,” said Falconbridge, sadly, 


LOTTIE AND ViCJTORINE. 


189 


shaking his head. “ The doctors always prophesied that my 
poor father would go off suddenly some day, if the gout should 
reach the region of his heart. Lottie/' to his wife, “lam 
sorry our happy holiday should be cut short so suddenly, but 
never mind: I shall not be absent long. Keep your spirits 
up, and write every day/' 

And Lottie, stunned and bewildered by the sudden parting, 
scarcely comprehended what was transpiring around her, un- 
til, standing on the pier close by the Clissmond House, she 
watched the Montreal boat steam away — the boat that was 
parting herself and her husband for the first time. 

Gerald Maury watched her a little nervously. He was not 
much used to the ways of women, and was not altogether cer- 
tain what it was best to do in a case of hysterics or swooning. 
But Lottie spared him the trial. She turned to him with a 
faint smile as the steamer disappeared behind the curve of a 
distant point of woods. 

“He is gone," she said. “ And yet it all seems like a 
dream to me. I wonder when I shall awake. " 

“It will only be for a little while," said Gerald, encour- 
agingly. 

“But I am keeping you," said Lottie, suddenly rousing 
herself to a sense of all the exigencies of the present. “ It 
will be dark before you can return to Bachelor's Hall." 

“I am not intending to return there, Mrs. Falconbridge," 
said Maury. “ I shall remain at the Clissmond House until 
Wallace comes back. There are a good many people here 
whom I know, and it will be less lonely than on the island." 

Lottie was silent. She knew that, although Maury was 
careful not to say so, the real reason of his change of resi- 
dence was that he might be near her, to save her every care 
and trouble, and to take, as far as possible, a brother's place 
toward her during the unavoidable absence of her husband. 

“ How can I ever thank you enough?" said she, looking up 
into his face with tears in her eyes. 

“ Thank me? For what?" But Gerald Maury colored 
deeply as he spoke, for he felt that she had fathomed his 
secret. 

“ J)o you suppose I do not know that it is on my account 
that you have left an island life, which you like, to be packed 
into a great swarming, human beehive of a hotel, which you 
do not like?" asked Lottie, half reproachfully. 

“ Well, it is partly on your account," owned Gerald, a lit- 
tle confused. “ But, Mrs. Falconbridge—" 


190 


LOTTIE AND VICTOltINE, 


“ Call mo Lottie/" said she. “ Remember, we are to be 
brother and sister now."" 

“ Lottie,"" he spoke the word reverently, as if it were the 
name of a saint, “ you must not think it is any act of self- 
denial on my part. Think how desolate the island would be, 
now that you and Wallace are gone! And I can introduce 
you to some very pleasant people here, if — ’" 

“ I would rather be introduced to no one,"" said Lottie, 
quietly but firmly. “ I shall be in my own room a good deal 
until Wallace returns, and solitude will be more congenial to 
me than the gayest society could be."" 

“ But you will walk with me, and let me row you about 
through these islands? What will Wallace say if he comes 
back and finds all the roses faded from your cheeks?"" 

“ With you? Yes,"" said Lottie, simply. “Because Wal- 
lace left me in your care. But not with any one else."" - 

And Mr. Maury was not at all dissatisfied with this arrange- 
ment. 

“ She"s a regular trump,"" said he to himself, as he un- 
packed his portmanteau in a little attic room — the only one 
he could manage to secure, in the present crowded state of 
the Clissmond House. “ She takes it all splendidly."" 

But Gerald Maury, not being gifted with second sight, did 
not know that at that identical moment Lottie was lying on 
the sofa in her room, some two stories below, pale, silent, 
and tear-drenched as Niobe. She had wept until the torrent 
of tears was dry— she had kissed Wallace"s picture over and 
over again — and now she lay there, with her face buried in 
the pillows, as if her heart was broken. 

Poor little Lottie! She had loved Wallace Falconbridge so 
dearly — and now he had gone and left her alone. 

And then, sitting up and pushing the tangled curls away 
from her wet cheeks, she began to calculate how long it would 
be before she could receive a letter or a telegram. 

“ I shall count the days until it comes,"" she said to herself. 
“ How strange it all seems— how sad! Up to this morning I 
was all in all to him — and now he has gone away into another 
world — a world where every one mistrusts me and looks cold- 
ly on me. But he is my husband now. He loves me, and 
they can not take him away from me, however much they 
may try. It is as he says— it will only be for a little while."" 

And Lottie tried to smile as she sat with Wallace"s picture 
in her hand— the picture that was so like him that it almost 
seemed as if it must open its lips to speak words of cheer and 
comfort as she gazed. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


191 


CHAPTER XXXV. 

THE GREEN-EYED MONSTER. 

The gray dawn of a sultry August morning was just be- 
ginning to be irradiated with the red stains of sunrise when 
Wallace Falconb ridge found himself standing on the steps of 
his father's house in Boston — a stately old stone mansion, 
which had held its own against the advance of population, 
and still stood in the middle of a fine, old-fashioned garden, 
where the close-cut lawns were like green plush, and the 
crescent-shaped flower-beds glowed with geraniums and ver- 
benas, as if they were painted with blood. The house itself 
had been modernized to suit the demand of civilization. Bay- 
windows of plate glass had been thrown out on either side, 
and a dome-shaped conservatory at the back was full of tropic 
palms, ferns, and blossoming orange-ttees. All the accessories 
spoke of taste, luxury, and abundant wealth— and as Wallace 
Falconbridge stood there, waiting for admittance, on the steps 
where he had so often played as a child, a strange sensation 
came over him, as of one who comes back after years of ab- 
sence. 

“ Can it be possible that it is only two months since I left 
home?” he asked himself. “ And yet it seems as if the 
events of a life-time had happened in those two months.” 

A sleepy servant presently came to admit him. 

“ Mr. Wallace!” he said, rubbing his eyes to make certain 
that this sudden appearance was not a part of his last dis- 
turbed dream. 

“ How is my father, Clements?” demanded the young 
man. 

“ He's better, sir.” 

“ Better? Thank God for that!” 

And the great reactionary bound of his spirits bore testi- 
mony to how terrible a dread had hitherto weighed them 
down. 

Mrs. Falconbridge met him at the door, in a loose wrapper, 
her face pale, and her eyes heavy with nights of watching and 
days of anxiety. 

“Oh, my son, my son!” she sobbed, as Wallace mutely 
strained her to his heart. “ 1 am so thankful that you have 
come. He is better; the doctor begins to have hopes at 
last.” 


192 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


“ Can I see him?” 

“ Not just now,” said the mother. “ He has fallen asleep, 
and must not be disturbed. But in all his waking hours he 
keeps calling for you.” 

“ Is he delirious?” 

“ Hot in the least. That is one thing that we have had to 
be thankful for, all through. But come into the breakfast- 
room, and let me give you a cup of colfee.” 

Miss Eden was in the breakfast-room, a little pale, to be 
sure, but exceedingly pretty, with a neglige of rose-colored 
ribbons in her raven hair, and a very becoming morning-dress 
of stone-colored cashmere, faced with pink silk. For it would 
have to be some very unexampled stress of circumstances 
which could induce Valencia Eden to neglect her personal ap- 
pearance. 

Wallace was a little uncertain about the reception which he 
might expect at the hands of this young lady, but she set- 
tled the question in an instant by coming forward and greet- 
ing him with a cousinly kiss. 

“ Dear Wallace, we all are so glad to see you,” said she. 
“ Aunt Marian, go and lie down again. 1 will give Wallace 
his coffee, and see that he is made as comfortable as possible.” 

And poor Mrs. Falconbridge, overcome by weariness and 
want of sleep, was glad to consent to this arrangement. 

“ And your beautiful wife?” said Valencia, as the door 
closed behind her aunt’s retreating footsteps. “ She is not 
with you?” 

“ Certainly not,” said Wallace, coldly, as he took his cup 
of fragrant coffee from his cousin’s hand. “ Nothing was 
said about her in the message. ” 

“ Ah, of course not,” said Miss Eden, apologetically. 
“ Dear Aunt Marian is so prejudiced! But I’m not sure that 
she is altogether right.” 

Wallace was silent. Valencia hesitated a little before she 
added : 

“ Pardon me, Wallace, if I am treading on dangerous 
ground, but I must confess at once that I am sorry I did not 
see your wife before we left the White Mountains. I am sure, 
from what you said, she must be good and beautiful—” 

“ She is both, Valencia.” 

“ And however we may have differed at the first of it, as 
your wife we should have received and welcomed her.” 

Wallace’s face softened somewhat at this. 

“ And,” added Valencia, watching the expression of his 
every lineament, “ if my uncle and aunt should ever be recon- 


LOTTIE AND VICTOR INE. 193 

cilecl to receiving her— and stranger things have happened— I 
should like her to know that 1 am her friend already/' 

“ I am much , obliged to you, Valencia," said Wallace, 
reaching out his hand and clasping hers. How cold and limp 
it lay in his — how unlike the clinging touch of Lottie's warm, 
pink palm ! 

Mr. Falconb ridge was better, but his improvement was so 
slight, so conditional upon a variety of conflicting circum- 
stances that Wallace found himself a prisoner at his father's 
bedside day after day. And, profoundly grateful and thank- 
ful as he was for what seemed to him the old man's restora- 
tion from the very jaws of the grave, he began to be uneasy at 
last, when he reflected how long he had been away from 
Lottie. 

Mr. Falconbridge seemed almost to read his son's thoughts 
in his eyes. 

“ Don't leave me, Wally; don't leave me," he whispered, 
feebly, one day, as he held out his thin, skeleton-like hand to 
his son. “ It will not be for long that I shall want you. 
You'll stay with me, Wally?" 

And Wallace could but promise. 

As the days crept by, slow and tedious, as days spent in the 
shadow of a sick-room can not but be, Valencia Eden studied 
to make herself as fascinating and agreeable as possible, and 
with no mean degree of success. And Wallace Falconbridge 
caught himself wondering, more than once, why he had never 
known his cousin in her true .character before. 

He had written only once to Lottie— a brief, hurried letter, 
scribbled in the intervals of attendance on his father's sick- 
bed — and latterly he had put off writing until he should be 
able to set some definite day for his return. 

“ I ought to write oftener," he told himself now and then, 
when his conscience pricked him a little, “ but of course dear 
Lottie will know how I am situated, and make all allowances 
for me." 

This philosophical frame of mind was, however, somewhat 
disturbed by a long and piteous letter from his young wife, 
earnestly entreating to know when Jie would return, and half 
reproaching him for neglect and coldness. Poor Lottie had 
written the letter one night when she was half heart-broken 
by the non-appearance of the expected epistle, and when it 
had gone, she would have given worlds to recall it. 

“ I ought to know that he is detained by necessity," she 
thought. “ I ought never to have assailed him by my child- 

7 


194 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


ish repinings. For the future I will strive to be braver, more 
worthy of mv position as Wallace's wife." 

But all this Wallace Falconbridge did not know— and his 
answering letter cut Lottie to the heart 

“ My dear Lottie, — You seem to have forgotten that 
there is anybody but yourself in the world. If you wish me 
to leave my father to die alone, say so. If not, you will per- 
haps spare me any more letters like your last. 

“ Your affectionate husband, 

“ W. Falconbridge." 

Lottie burst into the bitterest tears that had ever dimmed 
her eyes as she read the cruel words. 

“We have not been married a month," she sobbed, “ and 
he can write to me like this. But perhaps I have deserved it. 
I should never have sent that silly, fretful letter only I was so 
lonely and desolate. But it shall be a lesson to me for the 
future not to give way so readily." 

While Lottie Falconbridge was thus, figuratively speaking, 
sitting in sack-cloth and ashes. Miss yalencia Eden, far away, 
was conducting her mining operations in a way which would 
have done no discredit to a far more experienced engineer. 

“ What do you think, Wallace?' 5 she cried, entering the 
library, where her cousin, temporarily released from his vigils 
by the bedside of Mr. Robert Falconbridge, was trying to 
make up his mind to write to Lottie, and beg her pardon for 
that last cruel letter. “ But I am disturbing you," with a 
glance at his writing-case and ink-stand. 

“ Not at all. Go on. What were you going to say?" 

“ I have just received a letter from Mrs. Beamington — she 
that was Fanny Castleton, you know." 

“ I remember her," said Wallace, listlessly. “ A red-haired 
girl that was always giggling." 

“She was rather frivolous," admitted Yalencia. “But 
she is at the Thousand Islands with her husband — staying at 
the Clissmond House, and it seems she has met your wife 
there." 

Wallace looked up quickly. He was interested at last. 
Yalencia perceived this, and secretly triumphed. 

“ And she says — of course it's all gossip and nonsense, but 
it only shows which way the tide of opinion is setting— that 
Mrs. Falconbridge appears to be enjoying herself excellently 
well during your absence. She devotes herself entirely to 
Gerald Maury, and he is equally devoted to her. Such long 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


195 


walks and delightful boating expeditions as they have to- 
gether!” 

44 Indeed!” said Falconb ridge. 

“ That's what Fanny Beamington writes,” said Valencia, 
laughing. 44 It's well, Wallace, that you are not of a jealous 
disposition, or we should have a modern edition of Othello 
and Desdemona at once.” 

“ 1 am not jealous,” said Wallace, speaking somewhat con- 
strainedly, “ nor do 1 see that 1 have any reason to be. I left 
my wife especially in Mr. Maury's charge, and I am glad that 
he is making it as pleasant as possible for her.” 

“ Oh, of course!” said Valencia. But Wallace had the 
satisfaction of knowing that she did not believe a single word 
he said. 

He did not go on with his projected letter after Valencia 
Eden left him. 

44 If she is really so contented in my absence,” he said to 
himself, 44 1 need not hasten back.” 

Wallace Falconbridge had declared that he was not jealous; 
but it was a declaration not based strictly upon the truth. At 
that moment his ordinarily gentle and kindly nature was 
turned to the bitterest gall. He hated Gerald Maury; he was 
sullenly angry with poor Lottie, and if, by one motion of his 
hand, he could have crushed the gay, gossiping throng at the 
Thousand Islands, who had no better way pf employing their 
time than criticising their neighbors, he would have done it 
without a scruple. 

At that moment the servant brought in the letters that had 
arrived by that afternoon's post, and topmost in the heap was 
one postmarked 44 St. Salvador Bay,” and directed in Lot- 
tie’s round, peculiar handwriting. 

He tore it open, scarcely knowing whether to be pleased or 
indignant. It was written in Lottie's meekest and most peni- 
tent mood. 

44 You have every right to be angry with me, love,” she 
wrote. 44 It was unpardonable in me to write as 1 did; but I 
was worn out with watching for the letter that did not come. 
But 1 will try to be more patient and reasonable for the fut- 
ure, if you will promise to forgive my folly and petulance. 
Stay as long as it is necessary, and do not fear any more re- 
proaches from me. 1 am resolved to be contented until you 
are ready to return. Mr. Maury watches over me with the 
greatest care, and people in general are far kinder than 1 have 
any right to expect.” 


196 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


And the letter ended with reiterated vows of constant de- 
votion from his “ ever loving wife, 

“Charlotte Falconbridge.” 


“ She is getting very resigned all of a sudden, ” said Wal- 
lace, shrugging his shoulders, while his brow grew inexplicably 
darker. “I believe she gives me credit for being a greater 
fool than I am. ” 

Alas! the penitent little letter which had been written with 
such a studied endeavor to please, had produced a diametric- 
ally opposite effect. 

And Wallace Falconbridge wrote back curtly and briefly, 
expressing his gratification that his wife found herself so con- 
tented without him — a letter which was almost entirely devoid 
of all the little loving phrases and tender .terms of endear- 
ment that come so naturally to the pen of lovers. 

“ She shall ctslc me to come before I will go after her now,” 
said Wallace to himself, setting his teeth firmly together. 

Lottie was bewildered by this last epistle. She could not 
comprehend the changed and altered tone of her husband’s 
letters. 

“Has he ceased to care for me as he once did?” she asked 
herself, pressing both hands to her forehead. “ Or is it that 
they have contrived to estrange him from me, now that he is 
once more under the influence of those who always opposed 
me?” 

And in her perplexity she did what her better wisdom after- 
ward reproached her for doing — silo wed the letter to Gerald 
Maury. 

“ What does he mean?” she asked, piteously. “ Can it 
be possible that I have offended him?” 

Gerald Maury knit his brows and shook his head over the 
epistle. 

“ It’s all Greek to me,” said he. “I tell you what, Mrs. 
Falconbridge, I’ll write to him.” 

He did so — a brief missive, full of the highest praise and 
most admiring appreciation of his friend’s young wife, also 
expressing some surprise at Mr. Falconbridge’s protracted 
stay. 

“ I am sure you do not mean it,” he wrote; “ but it places 
your wife in a disagreeable position in more respects than 
one.” 

And this effusion, so well meant and genuinely honest, was 
like-oil on the flames of Wallace Falconbridge’s growing dis- 
content. 






L 


LOTTIE AED V1CT0KINE. 


197 


CHAPTER XXXVI. 

THE FALSE TELEGRAM. 

“ What have 1 done? Why do you not write freely and 
frankly as you used? Why will you not explain yourself, in- 
stead of hinting darkly at possibilities which I can not com- 
prehend ?” 

The cry of Lottie Falconbridge’s wounded nature went to 
her husband’s heart, as he sat in one of the airy garlanded 
bay-windows, twisting the envelope of the letter in his hand. 

The brief fever fit of jealousy was over now, and the natural 
sunny serenity of Wallace Falconbridge’s temperament was 
beginning to assert itself again. He was heartily ashamed of 
himself, and secretly resolved never again to be guilty of dis- 
trusting his young wife, who had confided her future so im- 
plicitly to him. 

“ 1T1 write at once,” he said to himself, looking lovingly 
down upon the tear-blotted lines her hand had inscribed. 
“ No, I won’t; I’ll telegraph.” 

Mr. Robert Falconbridge, having passed the crisis of his 
disease, was recovering with unexampled rapidity. He was 
already sitting up, and was beginning to anticipate with actual 
pleasure the journey to Florida, whither he was ordered by 
his physicians, to spend the autumn and winter. 

“ Of course 1 can’t ask you to come with us, Wally,” said 
the old gentleman. “ You have already shown yourself to be 
a model son, in leaving that pretty little wife of yours so long 
with the honey-moon but half over. Now I’ll tell you what, 
Wally, we were all rather hard upon you about that.” 

“ 1 thought so at the time,” said the young man, laugh- 
ing. 

“ 1 know it — I know it — but let by-gones be by-gones,” 
said Mr. Falconbridge, senior. “ We’ll turn over the page 
and begin on a clean leaf. You will go back to the Thousand 
Islands, and get your wife, and bring, her down to St. Augus- 
tine to spend the winter with us.” 

» “I am much obliged to you, sir,” said Wallace, really 
grateful for what he knew was a great concession on the old 
man’s part. 

“She shall be a daughter to us,” said Mr. Falconbridge. 
“ Or, perhaps, as i have to travel by slow and easy stages, 
you might join us at New York, and go on with us. Eh? 
What do you think of that?” 


198 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“ I think it would be an excellent plan,” said Wallace, 
brightening up, as he thought of the pleasure this arrange- 
ment would afford Lottie, whose greatest grief had been the 
estrangement she had been instrumental in producing be- 
tween her husband and his family. 44 Let us see — this is 
Wednesday, the fourth of September.” 

44 Yes,” said Mr. Falconbridge, looking at a little Russia 
leather covered calendar on the table his side, 44 it is Wednes- 
day, the fourth of September.” 

44 1 will telegraph my wife at once to be ready for an in- 
stant start,” said Wallace, 44 and I can easily reach the Thou- 
sand Islands by Friday evening. If we both start to-morrow, 
traveling as slowly as you will be compelled to do, 1 shall 
reach New York, with Lottie, quite as early as you will.” 

44 Of course, of course,” said Mr. Falconbridge, nodding his 
head. 44 And you’ll meet us at the Fifth Avenue Hotel?” 

44 Agreed!” said Wallace. 44 My dear father, you can’t tell 
how happy you have made me in thus becoming reconciled 
to my marriage.” 

‘‘You have deserved it, my lad; you have deserved it,” 
said the old gentleman, cordially. 

And Wallace Falconbridge hurried into the library and 
wrote on a slip of paper these words: 

44 Lottie, — I will be with you on Friday evening. Be in 
readiness to accompany me on the early Saturday boat to 
Montreal, on our way home. 

44 W. F.” 

He had scarcely written the signature when his father’s 
feeble voice was heard calling him from the bedroom above 
stairs. 

44 1 am here, sir,” he spoke. 

44 Would you mind just coming upstairs and dropping out 
my medicine, Wally?” said the old man, who had grown 
strangely meek and humble since his illness, and exchanged 
his domineering, arrogant manner for one entirely different. 
44 My hand shakes so that 1 can hardly trust myself.” 

44 1 will come immediately,” said Wallace, and he left the 
telegram lying on the library table. 

He had scarcely reached the head of tho stairs when a light 
footstep sounded on the library threshold, and Valencia Eden’s 
soft, silken skirts rustled into the room. 

Miss Eden had heard of the new plan from Mrs. Falcon- 
bridge, and was not at all pleased with it. Already, in the 
sinuous windings and twistings of her mind, she beheld a pos- 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


199 


sible future which would suit her idea exactly — an ever-widen- 
ing breach between the young husband and his wife, termi- 
nating ultimately in the Divorce Court, and leaving Wallace 
free to wed whom he would; an indestructible barrier between 
Lottie and the family into which she had aspired to marry, 
and a totally blighted life for the young girl who had dared 
to cross her own path. True, it seemed rather unreal, but 
Valencia Eden had seen enough of life to understand how 
often stranger complications than this may come to pass, if 
* only there is a sufficiently resolute and unscrupulous hand at 
the helm. 

And now this dawning reconciliation was at hand, to blot 
out all her plans and topple mercilessly down her carefully 
erected castle in the air. It was no part of Valencia Eden’s 
plan that Lottie Falconbridge should regain dominance over 
her husband’s heart; and her eyes glittered balefully as she 
read the words of the written message which lay on the table 
before her. 

Holding her lower lip firmly under the pressure of her firm, 
white teeth, she caught up a pencil and wrote on a fresh slip 
of paper the words: 

“ Come to me here at once. Lose not a second of time. 

“ W. F.” 

Folding it up, she hurriedly thrust it into a plain white en~ 
velope which lay on the table near. 

“ Good!” she whispered to herself. “ If once I can man- 
age to substitute this message for the one that my weak cousin 
really intended to send, things will be at cross-purposes all 
around. She will hurry to him at once — these fools of wives 
alwa} T s do when their gracious lords lift a beckoning finger — 
and he will make equal speed to join her. Both will be disap- 
pointed, and it will be hard if 1 can not contrive to make some 
capital out of the general misunderstanding. For matters are 
just at the crisis now in which the least straw of circumstance 
will suffice to turn the current either way.” 

Thus reflecting, she went to the foot of the stairs. 

“ Wallace!” she called, softly. 

“ Yes.” He answered her from the room above. “ 1 will 
be down directly.” 

“ Oh, you need not hurry,” said Valencia, sweetly. 
“ Clements is just going out— do you want him to take that 
message to the telegraph office— the message that is on the 
library table?” 


200 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“Certainly I do. Just put it in an envelope for me, 
Valencia, and tell him to lose no time. Stay— the address.:” 

“Oh, 1 have that,” said Valencia. “Mrs. Wallace Fal- 
conbridge, Clissmond House, St. Salvador Bay. Shall 1 add, 
‘ care of Gerald Maury?’ ” 

“ No,” he answered, brusquely— and Valencia smiled to 
herself as she mentally interpreted the meaning of the mono- 
syllable; “lam much obliged to you, Valencia.” 

“ Not at all,” Miss Eden answered — and calling the uncon- 
scious Clements, who' was reading the paper by a kitchen win- 
dow, where strings of scarlet runners and morning-glories 
made a shade almost equal, as the servants thought, to 
“ them there alcoves in the Central Park.” 

“ Clements,” said she, “Mr. Wallace wants you to take 
this message at once to the telegraph office.” 

“Yes, miss,” said Clements, sourly. Miss Eden was no 
favorite in the servants’ hall. 

“ And remember that you are to lose no time.” 

“ Yes, miss.” 

Valencia watched him from the bay-window as he went 
down the broad, flagged path, and out at the gate, turning in 
the direction which led to the telegraph office. And then, 
with a flickering smile just illumining the corners of her lips, 
she tore the genuine telegram in little bits, and scattered them 
in the scrap-basket that stood under the library table. 

“ And now I can go to my packing with a clear con- 
science,” said Miss Eden to herself. 

Mrs. Falconbridge greeted her with a smile as she entered. 

“ I was just thinking, Valencia,” said she, “ that if this 
Southern journey was too much for you — ” 

“ It will not be, Aunt Marian,” interrupted Valencia, 
hastily; “ and even if I dreaded it a‘ little, in the light of a 
journey, do you suppose I would let such a trifle as that keep 
me from you and Uncle Bobert? Pray, pray, do not speak of 
a separation.” 

Mrs. Falconbridge kissed her. “You are a good girl, 
Valencia,” said she. “ And I dare say it will be a great deal 
more cheerful for you when Wallace’s wife shall be of the 
party.” 

“ Certainly, dear aunt,” assented Miss Eden, with a mental 
shudder. “ But I don’t see that I can possibly get ready to 
accompany you to-morrow— on account of those dresses that 
Madame Boivin is so slow about.” 

“ But, my love, the doctor won’t hear of our delaying your 
uncle’s journey,” said bewildered Aunt Marian. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


201 


“ Of course not, Aunt Marian — do you think I could be 
selfish enough to expect such a thing?” rejoined Valencia, 
with eyes of mild reproach. “ But I was thinking I had bet- 
ter wait for them here — just to make sure, you know — and 
then overtake you at New York. I could easily do that by 
traveling all night.” 

“ But it will fatigue you so, my love.” 

“ Not in the least, dear aunt. I assure you I sha’n’t mind 
it. And I shall feel so much easier about the dresses. ” 

So matters were decided. For Miss Eden, although she 
could have done very easily without the dresses, was inwardly 
resolved to be on the ground, and do her best toward poison- 
ing the mind of Mrs. Wallace Falconbridge when she should 
find no anxious husband awaiting her. 

“ It will be a grand opportunity,” said Valencia to herself, 
as she sat serenely smiling on her aunt, “ and I never did be- 
lieve in half doing a job.” 

CHAPTER XXXVII. 

EROW ST. SALVADOR TO BOSTON. 

While Wallace Falconbridge, with all the passion and en- 
thusiasm of his first love glowing in his heart, was hastening 
as fast as steam could carry him in the direction of the Thou- 
sand Islands, Lottie was puzzling her brain over the telegram 
which had arrived so unexpectedly: 

“ Come to me here at once. Lose not a second of time.” 

Was he ill? Was he dying? Or what other strange con- 
juncture of circumstances had given rise to a brief, imperative 
message like this? Lottie lost herself in the mazes of con- 
jecture, and at last, no whit wiser than she was at the first, 
took the telegram down-stairs, and sending a servant to re- 
quest Mr. Maury’s presence in the parlor, showed it to him. 

“ What does it mean, Gerald,” she questioned, looking up 
in his face with the innocent perplexity of a child. “ What 
ought I to do?” 

“ It’s explicit enough, 1 am sure,” said Maury. “ Go to 
him.” 

“ At Boston?” 

“ Yes, at Boston. ” 

“ But do you think he is ill? Do you think anything has 
happened?” she pleaded. 

“ Not a bit of it,” Maury answered, cheerily. “ What 
should have happened?” 


202 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


“ But it is so abrupt/' 

‘ ■ My dear Mrs. Falconbridge, people don't generally in- 
dulge in much explanatory rhetoric in telegraphing messages," 
said Maury, pleasantly. 

Lottie laughed. “ / ought to know that," said she; “ but 
I believe this long suspense and waiting has made me nervous. 
Yes, I will go at once. I will take the, morning boat to Mon- 
treal, and from there it will be but a day's journey by rail." 

“ I'll accompany you as far as Montreal," said Gerald, 
carelessly. “I've some new things ordered there for the 
island, and I may as well go on and hurry them up." 

“ Will you?" Lottie's face brightened. “ That will be so 
kind of you, Gerald. For,, to tell you the truth, I rather 
dreaded the long, dreary journey by myself. But — " and the 
blood mounted into her cheeks, and she hesitated. 

“ But what?" 

“ Wallace says nothing about the bill here, and my money 
for traveling expenses." 

“ Oh, that is all plain enough," said Maury, lightly. “ He 
intended that I should see about all such things. Didn't he 
leave you especially in my charge? And are we not old 
friends, relatives in fact, and almost brothers?" 

“ It is a little awkward," said Lottie, with a forced smile. 

“ 1 do not see that it is, at all," said Maury, decidedly. 
“ You are no business woman, you see. Just get your pack- 
ing done as quickly as possible — that's all you have to concern 
yourself with." 

“It is such a pity this telegram did not come before the 
night boat went," said Lottie, sorrowfully. 

“ I know that, but we must make all the haste we can 


now. 


And Gerald Maury paid the hotel bills for both himself and 
Mrs. Falconbridge, and in the e'arly brightness of the next 
day’s morning the “ Montreal " bore them both away. 

Mrs. Beamington and her husband were among those who, 
in order to get an appetite for their breakfast, walked up and 
down the pier, listening to the playing of the band, and watch- 
ing the steamer glide away with crowded decks, fluttering 
pennons, and the waving of innumerable handkerchiefs. 

“ Upon — my — word," said Mrs. Beamington to one Miss 
Darling, who sat next to her at table, and was her dearest 
crony and especial friend, “ that is about the coolest proceed- 
ing I ever saw." 

“What is it, dear?" said Miss Darling, lifting her eye- 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


203 


“ Don't you see? Young Maury and Mrs. Falconbridge 
going away together, arm in arm, just like a pair of lovers. 
And he carrying her traveling-bag and shawls, and she looking 
up in his face as devoted as a turtle-dove. There — close to 
the guards. Don't you see?" 

“Yes, I see," said Miss Darling, with a disagreeable little 
laugh. 

“ And dear Augustus tells me that Mr. Maury actually paid 
all the hotel bills and engaged their passage to Montreal." 

“ You don't tell me so!" 

“ Yes," added Mrs. Beamington, “ and I really do think 
some one ought to let her husband know of the way she is 
going on here, while he, poor dear fellow, is away at the sick- 
bed of his father. But, dear me! they tell me she was only 
a telegraph girl. What can one expect?" 

Meanwhile, poor Lottie, entirely unconscious of the mali- 
ciously wagging tongues of the ladies at the Thousand Islands, 
was building fairy palaces of imagination as to the meeting 
which was so near, as she sat in a shady and sheltered spot, 
beneath the striped awning of the boat, her eyes fixed dreamily 
on the sparkling surface of the river, her cheek leaning on her 
hand. 

“ He has forgiven me all my folly and impatience," she 
said to herself, “ or else he never would have sent me word to 
come to him. And only think — by this time to-morrow I shall 
be at Boston." 

She shuddered a little internally as she thought of meeting 
the stately old gentleman, the dignified old lady with the sil- 
ver curls who had once tried to argue her out of her love for 
Wallace Falconbridge — most of all, Valencia, beautiful as a 
princess, cold as a statue of ice. But she had implicit confi- 
dence that her husband would make it all right. 

“ He would not have sent for me," she assured herself, 
“ if they were not prepared to receive me as his wife should 
be received. " 

While Gerald Maury, sitting silently beside her, with folded 
arms and hat bent slightly over his brows, was thinking over 
all the pleasant episodes of the- brief summer idyl which was 
now drawing to a close, half envying Wallace Falconbridge 
for the prize he had won, half wondering why his friend had 
not himself come to bring Lottie home. 

“ If I had a wife like that," thought he, “I would not run 
the risk of her traveling two or three hundred miles alone. 
Nor would I send her a message, 4 Come,' as a man whistles 
to his dog. I can't make Wally out of late; but this I do 


204 


LOTTIE AND VICTORIBTE. 


know, if he goes on at this rate he will stand a pretty good 
chance of estranging his wife’s affections before fie is many 
years older. If it was any less delicate matter I would vent- 
ure to give him a word of advice; as it is, however, I rather 
think I’d better hold my tongue.” 

At Montreal they parted. Reluctant as Gerald Maury was 
to let Mrs. Falconbridge proceed on her journey alone, he 
could find no reasonable excuse for accompanying her any 
further. 

“I am so much obliged to you,” said Lottie, looking up 
with tearful eyes, as he stood by her in a drawing-room car, 
after having secured the best accommodation he could for 

her. 

“Not in the least,” said Maury, “lam only too glad to 
have been of any service to you. 1 hope you’ll find it all 
right when you get there. You’re quite certain you have the 
address?” 

“ It is on the card that you gave me, safe in my traveling- 
bag,” said Lottie. 

“ Good-bye, then, and God bless you.” 

The “ iron horse ” blew out a volume of steam — the train 
gave a quiver through all its metallic joints — Gerald Maury 
sprung off, and for an instant a sensation of indescribable 
loneliness passed through Lottie’s heart. And until then she 
did not know how much she had depended upon Gerald 
Maury during her separation from her husband — how entirely 
her weakness had leaned upon his strength. 

“But it will be only a few hours, now, before I shall see 
Wallace,” she thought — and as her eyes were dreamily fixed 
upon the flying Canadian landscape, all empurpled in the early 
September twilight, she saw only the raptured moment of the 
meeting that was constantly drawing nigh. 

A long, dreary night ride followed — a ride during which 
Lottie slept but little, starting ever and anon from her 
troubled dreams with a flushed cheek and throbbing heart, 
and an uneasy sense of something having happened. But in 
the early dawn she aroused herself, bathed her face with 
Cologne, and strove, as far as she could, to arrange her hair 
at the little glass in the dressing-room. For she had all a 
woman’s instincts, and desired that her young husband should 
see her, after their long parting, at her best. And then she 
fastened her shawl, tied on the little black felt hat with the 
blue-bird’s wing, and set all ready for the final stop in the 
great Boston depot. 

“ Wallace will surely be there to meet me,” she thought. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 205 

“ He will know it is all strange to me, and his dear face will 
be the first I shall see.” 

And a glad thrill of happiness went through all her veins 
as she fancied the welcoming light in her husband’s eyes, the 
tender pressure with which he would infold her in his arms. 

For Lottie Falconbridge, be it remembered, was only eigh- 
teen, and just married. 

But, to her surprise, there was no one to meet her when the 
train slowly rolled into the depot, and she leaned from the 
window, eagerly scanning every face in the crowd that filled 
the building, early as it was. Involuntarily her heart sunk 
within her, although she tried to smile at her own folly. 

“ Of course he will be in the waiting-room,” thought she. 
“ Wallace always had a horror of crowds.” 

But there was nobody in the waiting-room but a sleepy 
stewardess and two or three travel- worn mothers of families, 
trying to polish up their babies’ faces by the aid of raspy 
towels and gritty soap. Lottie gazed blankly around her. 

“ Has there been any one here inquiring for me?” she asked 
of the stewardess. 

“For whom?” demanded that functionary, scratching her 
head with a knitting-needle, and looking with glassy eyes of 
half-aroused slumber at her questioner. 

“ For Mrs. Falconbridge?” 

“ No, ma’am.” 

“ Can I get a hack?” asked Lottie, after a second or two 
of hesitation. 

“ Plenty of ’em outside.” 

And Lottie, thus thrown back upon her own resources, suc- 
ceeded in making a hackman comprehend whither she wanted 
to go. 

“ To Mr. Falconbridge’s, on Marymont Square,” said she. 
“ Here are my checks.” 

“Mr. Falconbridge! The big stone house with the gar- 
dings around it?” 

“ I don’t know what kind of a house it is,” said Lottie. 
“ I never was there.” 

“ Them folks has gone to Florida to spend the winter,” said 
the hackman. “ My brother-in-law, he carried their trunks 
down to the express office.” 

“ You are mistaken,” said Lottie, with an air of calm su- 
periority. “ Please drive me there at once.” 

“ All right, miss,” said the hackman. “ It’s easy findin’ 
out. Anyway, the housekeeper’ll be at home, most likely.” 

And in another minute, Lottie Falconbridge found herself 


206 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


jolting over the stony streets, in the chill and drizzly morning 
atmosphere. 

A damp fog brooded like a shroud above the seaport city — 
the presence of smoke from a thousand chimneys hung low, 
and an east wind chilled the early passers to the very bone. 
Lottie Falconbridge could scarcely have selected a drearier or 
more cheerless time in which to enter the city of her husband’s 
nativity. 

“ And this is Boston?” she thought, looking from the hack 
windows. “ 1 do not believe I shall like it.” 

Miss Bamberley, the housekeeper on Marymont Square, 
had had a hard time of it packing, ordering the household, 
and reducing the general chaos to something like order and 
system after the departure of the family — and she was not well 
pleased, on this raw September morning, to be roused from 
her bed by a house-maid with her head tied up in a pocket- 
handkerchief. 

“ If it’s the butcher or the baker, why couldn’t you tell 
’em to call again?” she demanded, lifting her drowsy head 
from the pillow. 

“ But, please, ma’am, it ain’t the butcher or the baker. 
It’s a young lady askin’ after Mr. Wallace.” 

“ Well, stupid, didn’t you tell her he was gone?” 

“ I didn’t tell her nothing, ma’am,” said the maid. “ I 
hadn’t no orders.” 

“ Well, you are a fool!” said Miss Bamberley, crisply. “I 
suppose I shall have to get up myself. Though what business 
folks have inquiring around after other folks, at this hour in 
the morning, I’m sure 1 don’t know.” 

Lottie Falconbridge had been shown into a vast, barn-like 
apartment, where the chairs were all covered with gray linen, 
and the chandeliers, shrouded in covers, looked "like huge 
wasps’ nests depending from the ceiling. She sat there, 
chilled and uncomfortable, wondering what it all meant, and 
why the servant-maid had looked, so bewildered when she 
asked for Mr. Wallace Falconbridge. 

In a few minutes Miss Bamberley made her appearance. 
Lottie started up as the door opened, believing at first that it 
was her husband, but the wrinkled and acid countenance of 
the housekeeper at once dispelled any such illusion. 

“ What might you be pleased to want, miss?” said Miss 
Bamberley, with a distrustful glance at Lottie’s bag. “ We 
don’t never buy anything of traveling agents, nor yet we don’t 
subscribe.” 



LOTTIE AND VICTOKINE, 


207 


“ Is Hr. Wallace Falconbridge at home?” interrupted Lot- 
tie, with quiet dignity. 

“ No, miss, he ain't.” 

Lottie’s heart sunk within her. 

“ Where is he, then?” she asked. 

“ I don't exactly know,” said the housekeeper, without in 
the least mitigating her aspect of severity and distrust. “ He 
left here yesterday morning, and the family started for Flori- 
da in the afternoon.” 

“ Oau you not give me his address?” 

“I'll call Miss Valencia,” said the housekeeper, after a lit- 
tle hesitation. “ If anybody knows, she knows.” 

And with a glance around the room, to make sure that there 
were no portable articles of value lying around, which “ the 
young person ” might possibly confiscate and decamp with 
during her absence. Miss Bamberley shuffled out in her slip- 
pered feet. 

While Lottie, pressing her hand to her forehead, tried to 
comprehend her surroundings, and asked herself, over and 
over again: 

“ What does this mean? What can it possibly portend? 
Where's my husband, and why does he not come to me?” 

The click of a door-latch sounded behind her. Lottie turned 
quickly around and found herself face to face with Miss 
Valencia Eden. 

She was dressed in a long, trailing robe of silk, of that 
peculiar and brilliant shade of Mazarine blue which is becom- 
ing to brunettes, with an edging of swan's-down around the 
throat and down the front. Her jetty hair, curled low at the 
back of her head, a la Greek Slave, was fastened with a spark- 
ling blue arrow of lapis lazuli, and, early as it was in the 
morning, her long, shapely hands glistened with rings. 

Lottie knew her well by sight, but Miss Eden looked her 
full in the face, as if they were perfect strangers, and the 
young wife found herself compelled to introduce herself. 

“lam Mrs. Falconbridge,” she said, timidly. “ I believe 
1 am speaking to Miss Eden?” 

“ Mrs. Falconbridge started for St. Augustine, Florida, yes- 
terday,” said Valencia, coldly, as she shook out a perfumed 
pocket-handkerchief and removed an infinitesimal speck of 
dust from the flashy amethyst she wore upon her forefinger. 

“ Mrs. Wallace Falconbridge,” explained Lottie, blushing 
scarlet. Valencia looked her frigidly in the face. The hour 
for her revenge had come at last. 

“ Oh!” said she. “ You're the woman whom my cousin 






208 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


married in a fit of boyish caprice — of whom he is already 
tired. You are the woman who, daring his enforced ab- 
sence at his father’s sick-bed, have improved the opportunity 
by such a bare-faced flirtation with Gerald Maury that all 
St. Salvador is ringing with it! 7 ’ 

“ Miss Eden,” said Lottie, drawing herself up coldly, while 
two vivid crimson spots glowed on either cheek, 4 4 1 did not 
come here to quarrel with you or to listen to needless insult. 
Where is my husband?” 

44 He has gone!” 

44 Gone! Whither?” gasped poor Lottie. 

44 With his parents, of course. Where is his proper place 
just now?” 

44 And he has left no message for me?” wailed poor Lottie. 

44 What message could he leave?” sharply demanded Va- 
lencia, 4 ‘ except that he never wishes to look upon your false, 
fair face again?” 

44 1 do not believe you!” cried Lottie, driven to desperation 
by the goading stings of Valencia’s cruel tongue. 

44 Do not you? But you will, perhaps, when you learn the 
truth of what I am saying,” mocked Valencia. 44 Let me 
tell you, once for all, what you will soon enough discover for 
yourself. He married you in haste — he is repenting at leisure, 
lie loved me before he ever fell into your siren snares, and 
he loves me still. As for you, he has utterly disowned you 
and cast you off. We have not been ignorant, here, of the 
very edifying way in which you have conducted yourself at 
the Thousand Islands.” 

Lottie turned away, deeply mortified and stung to the heart. 
This, then, was her reception in her husband’s home! This 
the haven of happiness to which she had looked forward so 
long! Oh, if Wallace Falconbridge had ever loved her, how 
could he have had the heart to expose her to cruelty such as 
this? 

And the last sound which she heard, as she crossed the 
threshold of the grand house in Marymont Square, going 
forth, solitary and unfriended, into the world, was Valencia 
Eden’s mocking laugh. 

The jetty-eyed enchantress had triumphed. 


CHAPTER XXXVIII. 

AT CROSS- PURPOSES. 

The foliage along the St. Lawrence River was already be- 
ginning to glow in its brilliant autumnal colors, early as was 


LOTTIE AND VICTOR INE. 


209 

the season. Many of the islands were already deserted, their 
windows boarded up, their gay bunting packed away, and 
their little boats safely housed until the coming J une should 
deck the river shores with fresh foliage and garlands of newly 
blossomed ferns and wild flowers. 

Wallace Falconbridge, standing on the deck of the steamer, 
that was now heading for the St. Salvador point, looked al- 
most sadly at the deserted verandas and blank, staring case- 
ments of Bachelor’s Hall, as the boat glided past its velvet- 
smooth shores. Could it be possible that scarcely a month had 
elapsed since he and Lottie were so happy there together? A 
garland of ferns which Lottie had hung from one of the droop- 
ing boughs close to the water-side still swayed to and fro in 
the wind, limp and faded now; a rustic seat, under a superb 
white pine, where she had been wont to sit in those enchanted 
times, was still heaped with the withered blossoms she had 
culled on the very day that the telegram from Boston fell like 
a bomb-shell into their little camp of happiness. He sighed 
involuntarily, and then put up his field-glass to see if he could 
discern the graceful figure and bright, waiting face of his 
young wife in the little crowd that was at the boat-landing, 
as usual. 

But she was not there— or if she was, he could not distin- 
guish her from the rest. 

“ All ladies 'dress so much alike, now/’ reflected he, valor- 
ously striving to conceal from himself the involuntary pang of 
disappointment that he felt. “Of course she’s there! And 
Maury — I should suppose he might take enough interest in 
my coming to be on the lookout. But Maury always was an 
odd sort of fellow.” 

He sprung from the boat almost before the plank was ad- 
justed in its place, and strode up the gentle declivity toward 
the Clissmond House, looking to^the right and to the left, as 
he walked, for Lottie. 

“ Halloo, Falconbridge!” cried out Mr. Augustus Beam- 
ington, who sat on a point of rock serenely smoking his cigar. 
“Back again?” 

“Yes, back again,” said Wallace. Ordinarily, he disliked 
the Beamingtons, but at this moment of happy anticipation 
he would have been civil to the arch-enemy himself, if that 
much-abused individual should have happened to cross his 
path. “ I suppose my wife is out on the piazza somewhere?” 

“ Your wife?” said Beamington. And there was some- 
thing in the peculiar manner in which he spoke that made Fal- 
conbridge stop short in front of him. 


210 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


“ What do you mean?" he asked, sharply. 

* 4 Don't you know?" 

“ Know? What should I know? What on earth are you 
talking about?" 

“ She isn't here!" said Beamington, secretly wishing that 
anybody in the world had been there to divulge the evil tid- 
ings but him. 

“ Not here!" echoed Falconb ridge, turning a dull, ashy 
pallor. “ Where is she, then?" 

“ Went off in this morning's Montreal boat with Maury. 
Don't look so white and furious, old fellow — I don't want to 
hurt you, but I'm only telling you what every soul at St. Sal- 
vador knows. They went away together. He paid her hotel 
bills and engaged her passage." 

“ Whither did they go?" huskily demanded the young hus- 
band. 

“ Don’t know, I'm sure. To Montreal, I suppose. Look 
here, Falconbridge, you shouldn't have left her here all alone. 
She's young, you know, and — " 

But Wallace Falconbridge lingered to hear no more. Quiv- 
ering in every nerve with a white heat of indignation, which 
he was yet resolved to repress, he strode up the hill, determined 
to make still more inquiry before he should condemn his wife 
on evidence such as this. 

But the clerk at the office of the Clissmond House fully 
confirmed the statement made by Beamington. Yes, Mr. 
Maury had settled the standing account — the landlord had 
supposed by Mr. Falconbridge's instructions — and Mrs. Fal- 
conbridge certainly had left the Clissmond House under Mr. 
Maury's protection. How long ago? This very morning. 

“ But there must have been some misunderstanding," said 
Wallace, hotly. “ 1 telegraphed her to wait here for me!" 

The clerk put on a politely puzzled air. He could not at 
all understand what it meant. Was it not possible that Mrs. 
Falconbridge had gone to meet her husband? 

And Falconbridge, stunned and shocked, asked no more 
questions. There were the incontrovertible facts! Lottie had 
left the Thousand Islands, in defiance of his express injunction 
— had left them, in sight of all this swarming hotel, in the 
companionship of the false friend he had left, with such mis- 
taken confidence, to guard his interests during his absence. 
That Maury had played him false was not, perhaps, a matter 
of so much marvel. Maury was a man— ^nd men are villains 
by nature, as Falconbridge told himself, with set teeth and a 
black frown between his brows— but that Lottie— pure, inno- 


LOTTIE AND VICTOMNE. 


211 


cent Lottie, could so far have fallen from the high pedestal 
where he had placed her in his adoring worship, was beyond 
all belief. 

Yet there were the facts. And Falconbridge felt that Va- 
lencia Eden was right in the estimate that she had placed on 
Lottie’s character. 

He glanced at his watch. 

“ I shall still be in time for the night boat,” he said to him- 
self. “ I will hasten on to Montreal and get on this fellow’s 
track yet — and, by the sun that shines overhead, I will be 
revenged! This villain — this double-dyed scoundrel of a 
Maury shall learn that this stealing away of his friend’s wife 
is no matter lightly to be passed over. ” 

And he remembered, with a pang of remorse, how he had 
allowed day after day to elapse without hastening to his young 
wife’s side — how little attention he had paid to her entreating 
letters, and, at the very last, how brief and cold had been the 
talegram which he had dispatched to apprise Lottie of his 
coming. 

She had been wild and mad. Beyond all question she had 
been guilty — but had there been no excuse? 

“ 1 have been a brute!” thought Falconbridge, as he turned 
all these things over in his mind. “ 1 deserve to suffer in my 
turn, but not like this! Oh, God! my punishment is greater 
than I can bear!”* 

And all that night, gliding swiftly along over the glassy 
bosom of the St. Lawrence, W allace Falconbridge paced the 
deck without a single moment of sleep visiting his burning 
eyelids. 

“ If I had buried her,” he thought, “ I might still have 
worshiped her memory as that of a saint — but to love her like 
this ! It is not to be borne!” 

He reached Montreal the next morning, worn and exhausted 
as if he had passed through a month’s sickness, and, as he 
passed the great mirror at the foot of the hotel stairs, he 
started at his own reflection-— pale, haggard, and ghastly. 

“ Of course, I shall not find any trace of Maury here,” he 
thought, as he called a waiter to him. “ He has covered up 
his tracks too well for that. But I will at least make every 
endeavor. Is Mr. Maury here?” he asked of a white-aproned 
servitor who came shuffling toward him with noiseless carpet 



Yes, sir. No. 109, sir. Take your 


card up, sir?” 


212 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“ No; I will go to him myself. It is not necessary to in- 
troduce me — we are old friends.” 

And Wallace Falconbridge smiled grimly to himself as he 
thought that it would not do to give Gerald Maury time to 
hide himself away from an injured husband's vengeance. 

He knocked at the door of No. 199, a large and comforable 
apartment ou the second floor of the hotel, which Gerald 
Maury usually occupied when he chanced to be in Montreal. 

44 Come in!” called out Maury. 

He knocked again, and could hear his friend start out of 
his chair with a suppressed exclamation of annoyance. 

44 Who the deuce are you — and why can't you come in when 
you are told? Halloo, Falconbridge! it is never you!” 

And instead of shrinking, with guilty dismay and cowardly 
consciousness, from the flaming eyes of the young husband, 
Gerald Maury flung aside his cigar, and held out both hands 
with an aspect of the warmest welcome. 

But Falconbridge drew back. He felt that he could not 
touch the extended hand. 

44 Where is my wife?” he demanded, hoarsely. 

“ Your wife? Isn't she in Boston?” 

44 What should she be doing there?” hoarsely questioned 
Falconbridge. “Maury, do not lie to me! What have you 
done with her?” 

44 Hone with her? I? Wally, 1 believe you are a little 
crazed. Didn't you yourself telegraph for her to come to you 
without loss of time? Didn't I put her on the night train for 
Boston only last evening?” 

44 Your story is a little too transparent, Maury,” said Fal- 
conbridge, with a bitter attempt at a laugh. 4 4 1 telegraphed 
nothing of the sort.” 

44 1 beg your pardon, my dear fellow,” said Gerald. 44 1 
saw the telegram myself. I can tell you the very words: 
4 Come to me here at once. Lose not a second of time .' ” 

44 1 sent no such message,” exclaimed the astonished hus- 
band. 44 1 telegraphed that 1 would be at St. Salvador on 
yesterday— Friday evening. 1 requested her to be in readi- 
ness to return with me the next morning. ” 

44 Are you sure of this?” demanded Maury. 

44 As sure as 1 am that you stand before me at this mo- 
ment. ” 

“Then, by Jove!” cried Maury, 44 there must, have been 
some curious hocus-pocus about the telegraph wires. For I 
am equally certain that the message Mrs. Falconbridge received 




LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


213 


and showed to me was couched in the exact words I mentioned 
to you.” 

“ She did show it to you, then?”. 

“ What else was she to do? Don’t let your passion and 
prejudice blind you to the dictates of common sense, old fel- 
low,” said Maury, warmly. “She was there all alone, in a 
• strange place, without money to pay her bills, or eyen her 
traveling expenses — what was she to do but to consult with 
me, her husband’s friend, when she received an imperative 
j. summons to join you at once? Of course we took it for 
[ granted that you left all those matters in my hands. And 
you sent no such message, after all? The whole thing seems 
incredible.” 

“ I should like to see the message that she did receive,” 
said Falconbridge. 

“ Well, you can have that satisfaction if you wish,” said 
^ Maury, plucking impatiently at his mustache. 

“ She did not destroy it, then?” 

jU “ She did not — because it was left with me. I twisted it up 
and threw iu into the back of a little bronze match-safe that 
was on the mantel in my room. Why I did so 1 can’t say; 

< it certainly was not because I ever expected to want .it again. 
I only know that I did so — and the odds are nineteen to 
twenty in favor of its being there yet. ” 

“I’ll telegraph to the landlord,” said , Falconbridge. 
“ Maury, I believe after all that 1 have misjudged you. Lend 
me a pencil, please.” 

And sitting down at his friend’s table, he hurriedly scrib-' 
bled off a message to the landlord of the Clissmond House. 

“ Send nfe exact contents of telegram in bronze match-box 
i in room No. 306.” 

“ While you are about it,” suggested Maury, “ you had bet- 
t ter telegraph to Boston to see if Mrs. Falconbridge has arrived 
Jr there in safety. ” 

“ It’s a good suggestion,” said Falconbridge. “ I ought 
to have thought of it myself, but I believe I am half wild, 
through distress and loss of sleep.” 

He dispatched both missives to the telegraph office, and sat 
down to await, with what wretched share of philosophy he 
might, the expected answer. Toward the close of the longest 
day he had ever known, they came — the one from the Cliss- 
- mond House, in the Thousand Islands, first: 


2U 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“ Telegram found as stated. Contents are: * Come to me 
here at once. Lose not a second of time. — Wallace Fal- 

CONBRIDGE. ' ” 

“ Didn't I tell you so?” said Maury, shrugging his 
shoulders. 

Faiconb ridge looked very pale and stern. 

“ I never sent that message,” said he. “ Before Heaven, 
there has been some foul play here of which I am utterly un- 
aware. ” 

At the same moment a servant brought in a second mes- 
sage, sent by Miss Bamberley, the housekeeper in Marymont 
Square, who, it may be remembered, was quite ignorant of the 
interview between the unknown stranger and Miss Eden: 

“ Respected Sir,— Mrs. Wallace Falconbridge has not 
been here. — Ruth Bamberley.” 


CHAPTER XXXIX. 

MRS. TREVENARD'S NURSERY. 

Saturday afternoon was always a busy time at the literary 
establishment of Mrs. Hennery. Little school-girls came 
thither for novels wherewith to beguile the holiday hours — 
maid-servants hurried in, with penciled orders for this, that, 
or the other recent publication— half -grown boys deliberated 
long whether they should draw out stirring biographies or 
works of impossible adventure, and sentimental young ladies 
dispatched Mrs. Hennery and her young lieutenant hither and 
yon in search of the latest novels. The good woman, accord- 
ing to her own version of affairs, invariably “ lost dier head ” 
on Saturday afternoons. 

“ It's enough to try the patience of a saint,” groaned she, 
with “ Lady Audley's Secret ” under one arm, and “ What 
Will He Do With It?” under the other, and “ Norine's Re- 
venge ” clasped tightly between her chin and her collar-bone, 
as she climbed down from a little step-ladder, which she used 
to reach the volumes from the higher shelves. “ Here’s the 
4 Revenge/ Miss Piper. You,- little boy,” to an apple-faced 
urchin whose saucer-blue eyes were just on a level with the 
counter, “ go home and tell your mamma that * Three Feath- 
ers ’ is out, but I've a copy of 4 The Way We Live How/ 
I've been a-savin' of for her. No, no; I tell you, no,” to an 
importunate lady’s-maid who was pulling at her sleeve and 
whispering. “ All four of the ‘ Eight Cousins ' is out. I do 




LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


215 


wish, sometimes, there wasn’t no such things as new books. 
Every one wants ’em at once, and — yes, yes, dear,” to a little 
lame girl, “ I kept ‘ Bluebeard’s Keys ’ on purpose for you, 
under a heap of pamphlets. Take ’em, and be very careful 
how you cross the streets, for them butchers’ wagons wouldn’t 
care if they drove over the aldermen and Common Council. I 
do declare,” to Victorine, who, with pen and ink, was busy in 
keeping the accounts, “if Job had kept a circulatin’ library 
there wouldn’t a-been no need of them potsherds as he scraped 
himself with, at all!” 

Victorine could not help laughing at Mrs. Hennery’s rather 
unusual interpretation of the Scriptures; but just as she 
turned to the shelf behind her for a sheet of fresh blotting- 
paper, she saw a pale, slender young lady, dressed in a travel- 
ing suit of brown checked silk, with a dotted lace veil over her 
face, who had just entered. 

“ Is Miss Avenel in?” she asked in a low voice of Mrs. Hen- 
nery — and the next second Yictorine’s arms were thrown con- 
vulsively around her. 

“Lottie!” 

“ Darling Vic!” was all that Lottie could utter through 
her tears. 

“ It’s her sister, I do declare!” said honest Mrs. Hennery, 
opening the door of the tiny back room, where a turn-up bed- 
stead stared the visitor in the face, in its feeble guise of a 
high-backed sofa, and the window commanded a cheery pros- 
pect of a whitewashed wall. “Go in there, dear, and have 
your talk all to ^ourself; but don’t be long, for I’m well-nigh 
about driv’ to death.” 

And, in hurried whispers, Lottie told her story to her sister. 

“ So, you see, to all intents and purposes,” she added, with 
a very unsuccessful attempt at a laugh, “lam here as a de- 
serted wife.” 

“ But, Lottie — dear Lottie!” pleaded Victorine, “ he never 
could have meant it.” 

“Meant it?” repeated Lottie, bitterly; “of course he 
meant it! I’m sure it is plain enough. I have heard of such 
things before, but,” with a choking sob, “ 1 never dreamed 
that they would happen to— me!” 

“ But, Lottie, what are you going to do?” questioned pity- 
ing Victorine. 

“ To earn my own living, again, and be independent of 
him,” Lottie answered, with constrained composure. “ Vic, 
you are the only friend 1 have left— 1, that deemed myself so 
rich in love but a brief while ago! Help me— advise me. A 


216 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE/ 


little while ago I would have needed neither, so strong was 1 
in my own resources. Now it is all different. I am weak 
and stunned — I feel that 1 must lean on some one for aid and 
comfort.” 

And she let her head fall on Victorine 's loving shoulder. 

“ Lottie,” said Victorine, tenderly caressing the short, 
shining curls that touched her cheek, “ let us go to Mrs. 
Hartford. She will advise us what to do. ” 

And, greatly to the dismay of good Mrs. Hennery, Victorine 
excused herself from further attendance at the emporium on 
that afternoon, and went to Mrs. Hartford's house on Lexing- 
ton Avenue at once. 

Mrs. Hartford was surprised at the unexpected sight of her 
young protegee coming home at that time in the day — still 
more so when she saw who was her companion, and listened 
to the tragic story of poor young Mrs. Falconbridge's woes. 

“ What would 1 do?” said Mrs. Hartford, when Miss 
Avenel put the question. “ I would go straight back to my 
husband's home, and remain there until he came personally 
to clear up all this mystery. " 

“ I can not do that,”*said Lottie, shrinking at the recollec- 
tion of Valencia Eden's cruel words. No, no, no! There 
is a point of moral humiliation below which no woman should 
voluntarily allow herself to fall! A deserted bride — an in- 
sulted wife — should not crouch to be trodden still lower into 
the dust. 1 still respect myself, but I could not even do that 
if I did not endeavor to maintain a woman's true dignity. 
No, Mrs. Hartford, advise something else.” 

Mrs. Hartford shook her head. 

“ I am by no means sure of the wisdom of your resolu- 
tion,” said she; “ but if you are determined to abide by this 
course — ” 

“ I am determined!” said Lottie, cold and pale as a statue. 

“ Then I think I may, perhaps, help you to a livelihood,” 
said Mrs. Hartford, kindly; “ that is, if you have not set your 
ideas too high.” 

“ I would go on my knees in a kitchen and scrub, if it were 
necessary,” said Lottie, earnestly. “Or I would go out into 
the fields like a German woman and dig potatoes or harvest 
corn!” 

Mrs. Hartford laughed. 

“ What 1 have to propose will not be quite such downright 
manual labor as that,” said she; “ but I question if it will be 
much easier. 1 was walking with the children in the Central 
Park yesterday afternoon, and I met a friend there — Mrs. 


LOTTIE AND VICTOKINE. 


217 


Trevenard of Forty-seventh Street — who told me she was 
looking for two superior girls, one for nursery governess to 
her three little ones, a second fof nurse to the youngest, a lit- 
tle creature of two or three years old who is suffering from 
hip disease. They are going on to Niagara Falls, where Mrs. 
Trevenard is to meet her husband, who has been fishing in the 
lakes. Mrs. Trevenard thinks that travel and change of air 
will do her sickly child good, and she is willing to pay high 
wages to a reliable person. Now, I think, Mrs. Falcon- 
bridge — ” 

“ Not that!” said Lottie, raising her hand as if to ward off 
the unwelcome name. “ Call me Miss Avenel again, please.” 

“ Miss Avenel, then — I think that you could succeed, with 
what references I might be able to give you, in obtaining 
either of these situations.” 

“ I would rather nurse the little sick baby,” said Lottie, 
who was fond of children, and full of tender pity and compas- 
sion for their ailments. 

“ And 1 will take the place of nursery governess,” said Vic- 
torine, eagerly. “Oh, Mrs. Hartford, please help me to get 
it!” 

“ What! and leave Mrs. Hennery?” cried Mrs. Hartford, 
in surprise. 

“ Mrs. Hennery has been very kind,” said Victorine, in a 
low tone, “ but if 1 took this situation I could be with Lottie.” 

“ Well, dear, I can’t blame you for that,” said kind- 
hearted Mrs. Hartford. “ It is natural enough, I am sure.” 

“ But had we not better go at once?” pleaded Lottie. 
“ While we are discussing the matter, this Mrs. Trevenard 
may be suiting herself elsewhere. ” 

“ As soon as you please,” said Mrs. Hartford. “I’ll ring 
for my bonnet and go there with you at once. ” 

“Dear Mrs. Hartford!” whispered Victorine, “how good 
you are! What should I do without you?” 

“ My darling,” said Mrs. Hartford, with an affectionate 
little squeeze of the hand, “you know very well that I’d do a 
great deal more than that for you, if only 1 had the chance.” 

Mrs. Milo Trevenard lived in a handsome house on Forty- 
seventh Street, and was a tall, gra^e-looking matron, dressed 
in thick black silk, with old point-lace at her throat and wrists, 
and big diamond solitaires in her ears. She listened to Mrs. 
Hartford’s story with the utmost interest, asked the two sisters 
a few questions, and at last decided to engage them at a salary, 
as she loftily phrased it, of sixteen dollars a month each. 

“Of course,” said she, “the compensation accorded to -a 


218 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


nursery governess is generally the highest, but in this case the 
care of little Philly is really heavier than that of the other 
two.” 

“ I am quite satisfied, ma'am,” said Yictorine. 

“ And 1 have no fault to find,” added Lottie. “ But I 
should like to see the boy. ” 

“ You shall,” said Mrs. Trevenard, her cold eyes brighten- 
ing at the interest evinced in her darling by the new nurse. 
“ Come this way, please.” 

And she led the way into her nursery, a large, cheerful 
apartment with its floor strewn with toys. 

Two little girls were playing at building blocks — chubby, 
dimpled creatures, of four and six years old, who were intro- 
duced by their mother, under the euphonious titles of Mo~ 
nimia and Jacquelind — shortened for their own use into 
“ Jacky ” and “ Nimmy ” — and a pallid little creature, with 
wasted limbs and preternaturally big eyes of deep sapphire 
blue, lay in the lap of the nurse who was to be discharged for 
having too many “ followers.” Involuntarily Lottie took him 
into her arms. 

“ Oh, the poor little fellow!” said she, with her sympathetic 
eyes full of tears. Little Philly, seeing, with a child's in- 
stinctive penetration, that he was held in a loving clasp, put 
his arms around her neck. 

“Me love 'oo,” said he, impulsively. And Mrs. Trevenard 
was conquered by this little incident. She had half fancied at 
first that the new nurse was too “ fine-ladvish ” to suit her, 
that she was too pretty, and spoke with too much self-posses- 
sion — but she forgot all this in an instant. 

“ I am so glad the dear little fellow has taken a fancy to 
you, Miss — Miss — ” she hesitated. 

“ Call me Charlotte, please,” said Lottie. Somehow she 
shrunk from giving her pet name up into the mouths of all 
the world. Wallace had called her “ Lottie,” and even though 
he had proved false, the sweet syllables seemed sacred to him 
alone. 

“ Charlotte? And your name?” turning to the younger 
sister. 

“ It is Yictorine.” 

“ Are you French?” asked the lady, somewhat suspiciously. 

“ No, madame. I am an American girl.” 

And Mrs. Trevenard seemed better satisfied with that. 

So the two sisters found themselves unexpectedly provided 
for at one and the same time. Victorine went immediately to 
Mrs. Hennery, as soon as she could get her things packed for 




LOTTIE AND VICTOKINE. 


219 


the immediate departure which Mrs. Trevenard contemplated. 
Mrs. Hennery was on a step-ladder, her spectacles lifted over 
her nose, and her blonde-trimmed cap on one side, while half 
a dozen eager customers were clamoring at her at once. 

“ I never was so glad to see any one in my life,” said Mrs. 
Hennery, as she caught sight of her assistant. “ Take off 
your things, dear, and help me.” 

“But I can’t take off my things, Mrs. Hennery, and 1 
can’t help you,” said Victorine, who could scarcely help 
laughing at the comical figure the mistress of the circulating 
library made, “lam going away.” 

Mrs. Hennery sat herself helplessly down on the top of the 
step-ladder. 

“ Going away?” she echoed. “ And where?” 

“ To Niagara Falls first, I believe,” Victorine answered. 

“When?” 

“ Next Tuesday afternoon.” 

“ Is the world coming to an end?” demanded Mrs. Hen- 
nery, in despair. 

“Not that I know of,” said Victorine, smiling. “Dear 
Mrs. Hennery, you have been very kind to me — be kinder 
still, and tell me that you are not offended with me because of 
this abrupt departure, which, indeed, I can not help.” 

And she would not leave the old lady until she had won her 
assurance of pardon. 

“ 1 can’t blame you, my dear,” said Mrs. Hennery. “ Of 
course sisters like to be together — but I’d got used to you, and 
at my time of life it’s no trifle getting used to strangers. And 
I never had the books kept so neatly before.” 

Mrs. Hartford was all in a bustle of packing on Monday 
morning, when Victorine went to bid her good-bye. Wooden 
boxes filled the hall, open trunks yawned around, aud bales 
of straw lay scattered about. Mrs. Hartford burst out laugh- 
ing at Victorine’s look of blank dismay and surprise. 

“ It’s all true, Victorine,” said she. “ You are not asleep 
and dreaming. We start for Europe on Wednesday.” 

“ For Europe?” 

“ Mr. Hartford ’s brother has telegraphed us to meet him in 
Paris. We are to cross the Alps together, and spend the win- 
ter in Italy — won’t that be delicious?” 

“ Then it is just as well,” said Victorine, “ that 1 have 
found a new home, for my old one would have been broken 
up.” 

“ I am afraid it would, my dear,” said Mrs. Hartford. 
“ Unless I could have persuaded you to accompany me.” 


22 0 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


Victorine shook her head. “ Oh, no!” said she, “ 1 could 
not have done that.” 

“ But you do not know how glad I am that you have got a 
good home where you are,” added Mrs. Hartford. “ Mrs. 
Trevenard is a good woman, although she is full of odd whims 
and caprices, and 1 am sure you will love the dear little chil- 
dren. And that beautiful sister of yours— 1 do so hope that 
she will finally be reconciled to her husband again. These 
dissensions are so terrible!” 

“ But he has treated Lottie so cruelly/ 7 pleaded Victorine. 

“ My dear, she took him, as the Prayer Book says, ‘ for 
better — for worse. 7 77 

“ Not such a ‘ worse 7 as that, 77 cried Victorine. “ You 
forget that it was literal desertion, Mrs. Hartford. 77 

Mrs. Hartford sighed. “ Ah, Victorine, this world is full 
of crooked places, 77 said she. “ Sometimes they are straight- 
ened out in this life, and sometimes they are not. We can 
only trust in God, and bide His good time to make it all clear. 
Kiss Lottie for me, and tell her to try and think as charitably 
of her husband as she can. 77 

That night Lottie and Victorine slept in each other’s arms 
in the nursery at the Trevenard house, with the two chubby 
girls nestled into a French bedstead on one side, and little pale 
Philly in a crib on the other. And Victorine told her own 
story in whispers to her sister’s sympathetic ears. 

“ But, love, 77 murmured Lottie, with wet cheeks, “ you are 
not so miserable as I, for he never was your husband. 77 

“ That is the very reason that I am more miserable, 77 sobbed 
poor Victorine. “You at least have drunk of the cup of 
happiness, even though it was a brief draught. 1 lost my 
heritage before I ever owned it. 77 


CHAPTER XL. 

THE JEALOUS WIFE. 

The sunshine of a glorious October morning was turning 
the crystal-green mist of Niagara Falls to prismatic glitters — 
the woods on Goat Island were all in a glow of gold, and rus- 
set, and crimson leaves. Purple aster and plumes of golden- 
rod nodded over the verge of the great cataract— birds twit- 
tered softly in the foliage overhead, and here and there groups 
of tourists wandered through the secluded paths among the 
woods. And, sitting at the foot of a cedar-tree, with the soft 
sunbeams waving themselves about her jet-black hair, and a 
golden veil of haze hanging over the Falls, Lottie Falcon- 


LOTTIE AND YICTOKINE. 


221 


bridge had almost forgotten her breaking heart and ever-pres- 
ent sorrow in the universal smile of Nature. 

Little Philip Trevenard lay beside her on a silken cushionj 
a coverlid of pink silk and swan's-down protecting his helpless 
limbs from any too searching breeze, and Lottie was bending 
over him with a bunch of asters, at which he laughingly 
grasped, and Mrs. Trevenard sat by, happy in her child's de- 
light. 9 

“ Look, Mrs. Trevenard, look!" cried Lottie. “I do be- 
lieve there is a real glow of color in his cheek." 

“It is the reflection of your own roses, dear," said Mrs. 
Trevenard, kindly. 

While, a little further on, Victorine was wandering through 
the illuminated recesses of the woods, with Monimia frisking 
in front of her, and little Jacquelind clinging tightly to her 
hand. She had fastened a wreath of scarlet leaves around her 
black felt hat, and carried a long stalk of golden-rod in her 
v hand, an unconsciously beautiful impersonation of the goddess 
of autumn as she walked. 

Presently Monimia, who had run on before in search of a 
squirrel who had mysteriously disappeared in the hollow 
depths of an ancient tree, came hack panting, and out of 
breath. 

“Victorine," cried she, “please tell us the story of the 
Ugly Duck aclain. It is so inter-es^-ing. Jacky, don't you 
want to hear the story of the Ugly Duck adain?" 

Jacky nodded her head as many times as if she had been a 
Chinese mandarin. Her appetite for stories was perfectly in- 
satiable. 

“ Please, Vicky," coaxed she, putting up her plump lips 
for a kiss. “ Jacky 's tired now. Jacky wants to west. Sit 
down and tell we the 'tory of the Uddly Dut." 

And Victorine sat down, her head still garlanded with brill- 
iant autumn leaves, her cheeks pink as wild roses, and gath- 
ering the little ones close toiler, told them the world-renowned 
tale of dear old Hans Christian Andersen for the hundredth 
time, at least. 

But just as she was nearing the most thrilling part, a rustle 
of silken skirts over the fallen leaves that strewed the path 
warned her of approaching strangers-^ she stopped short, and 
looking up, met the surprised gaze of — Oliver St. Charles. 

His wife was with him, attired in light-gray silk, with a 
white chip hat, half hidden by a snow-white willow plume, 
lavender gloves, a point-lace parasol, lined with dove color, 
and a festoon of glittering chatelaine chains hanging from her 


222 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


belt— exultant, triumphant, and talking very loud, as she 
leaned heavily on her husband's arm. The bridegroom, on 
the contrary, was pale and silent, and bad walked along with 
abstracted eyes fixed on the distant Horseshoe Falls. 

But the instant his glance fell on Victorine Avenel's lovely, 
flushed face he started forward, his whole countenance lighted 
up with animation and delight. 

“ Victorine!" « 

The former Miss Fordham turned around sharply at the 
word, and also recognized Miss Avenel. 

“ Victorine Avenel!" cried she. “ How on earth came you 
here?" 

Victorine had turned very pale at first, but now her face 
gleamed with tell-tale blood — her pulses throbbed tumultu- 
ously, and she could scarcely stand erect for the trembling of 
her limbs. Monimia, who had also scrambled to her feet, was 
.pulling gently at the silver smelling-bottle, with its mother- 
of-pearl top, that hung from Mrs. St. Charles's belt; while 
Jacky, her plump hands stroking down the silver-gray silk 
overskirt, kept saying, in a soft voice: 

“ Pitty frock! Pi tty yady! Jacky will tiss pitty yady." 

But Sara jerked her dress away. 

“ Who are these brats?" she indignantly demanded. 

“ Jacquelind, come here. Monimia, let go of that chain!" 
cried Victorine, with an air of quiet authority that the chil- 
dren had long ago learned to obey. The first shock of the 
unexpected meeting was over; and although Victorine felt 
stunned and crushed, like one over whom the remorseless 
wheels of Juggernaut have rolled, she had, in some degree, 
regained her self-possession. “ They are the children of my 
mistress, Mrs. Trevenard." 

“ Of — your mistress?" echoed Sara. 

“ Yes; I am a nursery governess," said Victorine, with a 
moral courage of which, a few months ago, she would scarcely 
have deemed herself capable. 

“ A nursery governess. You! Mr. Avenel Churchleigh's 
daughter!" cried Sara, still holding tightly on to her hus- 
band's arm, so that he could not have retreated, even had he 
willed to do so. 

“ Yes. Why not? I hope I see you quite well, Mrs. St. 
Charles?" 

She spoke the bride’s new name with an effort, and a crim- 
son flush crossed the brow of the man who had been her lover 
as she uttered it. 

“ I am quite well," said Mrs. St. Charles, dropping her 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


223 

husband’s arm. “ Pray walk on, love. I will overtake you 
before you reach the bridge. ’’ 

But to his wife’s infinite chagrin and displeasure, Mr. St. 
Charles paused. 

“ You have not shaken hands with me, Miss Avenel,” said 
he. “ Ma^ I hope that, in spite of your abrupt departure from 
Charlesworth, three months ago, we are still friends?” 

“ Certainly,” said Victorine, with averted eyes, as she felt 
the strong pressure of his hand over the cold and trembling 
palm she laid within it. 

And, raising his hat, Oliver St. Charles walked on,. a strange 
medley of emotions surging within his heart. The sight of 
Victorine Avenel’s face had awakened a thousand dormant 
feelings which he had fondly deemed laid to rest forever— the 
light of her blue eyes had kindled anew the fires upon the 
sacred altar of his heart. 

“Oh, God!” he muttered to himself, smiting his forehead 
with his clinched hand, “am I so weak and wicked that, mar- 
ried to one woman, 1 yet can not banish my love for another? 
If I had never seen her again, I might have worshiped her 
without sin, as one worships at the shrine of a Madonna; but 
now — ” 

lie paused, and looked out over the thundering volume of 
waters as it rushed headlong over the grandest abyss in the 
world, with eyes that saw not the wondrous sight, and brow 
all beaded over with cold sweat. 

As Oliver St. Charles stood there, fighting within his own 
soul the hardest battle that ever falls to mortal to endure, his 
bride was standing loftily before her old friend, twisting the 
white silk tassels of her parasol around and around as she 
spoke. 

“ Of course, Victorine,” said she, “ if you have deliberately 
chosen this path in life — ” 

“ As I most certainly have,” said Victorine, quietly. 

“ You can hardly expect your friends to countenance a oe- 
havior that is at once so eccentric and so unlady-like.” 

“ Have I asked for their countenance?” Victorine ques- • 
tioned, the scarlet spot of anger beginning to flutter on her 
cheeks. But Sara went on, quite regardless of her words: 

“ Had I been aware of this, I should not have greeted you 
as I did ; for of course you can not hope to be recognized and 
received on terms of equality by ladies. I must, therefore, 
beg that you will make no efforts to resume your old acquaint- 
ance with myself and Mr. St. Charles.” 

“ Be quite assured, Mrs. St. Charles,” said Victorine, draw- 


224 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


ing herself up, “ that you will not be troubled by any such 
4 efforts ’ on my part.” 

And the bride swept away, again trailing her silken skirts 
over the dead leaves, and feeling that she had quite vindicated 
the dignity of her position. 

“ Well, dear,” she began, sweetly, as she slipped her arm 
once more into that of her husband, “ you loolf pale and 
tired. “ 1 hope 1 haven’t kept you waiting?” 

“ Not at all,” said St. Charles, with an effort. 

“ I just stopped behind to tell Victorine Avenel how thor- 
oughly we disapproved of her conduct,” added Sara, in a self- 
satisfied voice, “ and — ” 

“ We?” repeated St. Charles, pausing a little. “ I do not 
disapprove of it in the least.” 

“ Not disapprove of her taking a servant’s place? Not dis- 
approve of her moving away from her father’s protection?” 
cried Sara, in angry surprise. 

“ For the last she is responsible to her own conscience, in- 
stead of to us. For the former,” said St. Charles, slowly, “ it 
is the person that elevates and ennobles the position. Miss 
Avenel would be a perfect lady in whatever sphere of life she 
might be pleased to adopt.” 

Sara dropped her husband’s arm indignantly, turning very 
red. 

“ Then it is true!” she cried out, in a voice half suffocated 
with anger. 

“ What is true?” 

“ What every one tells me— that you were in love with Vic- 
torine Avenel before you ever proposed to me — and that you 
still love her.” 

St. Charles turned deathly white and bit his lip. 

“ Sara,” said he, “ this is scarcely meet language for a wife 
to use to her husband. I was in love with Miss Avenel. 1 
never denied it, even to you. 1 still respect and admire her 
more than any living creature. But when you speak of love , 
pray remember that you are accusing me, your husband, of a 
downright crime.” 

But even as he spoke a spasmodic thrill contracted all his 
features, for he knew in his secret heart that before the judg- 
ment-seat of Heaven he was guilty of this crime. 

Sara burst into hysterical tears. Her husband strove to 
quiet her. 

“ Sara,” said he, sternly, “ control yourself. Remember 
that you are in a public place.” 

“ 1 don’t care! I don’t care for anything or anybody!” 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


22 5 


cried out she, passionately. “ Not two months married yet, 
and my husband tells me, in plain words, he don't care for 
me, and never did. 1 wish I was dead!" 

“I have never told you anything of the sort," said St. 
Charles, almost impatiently. 

“I wish I was dead! I wish 1 was dead!" sobbed Sara, 
sinking down on a rustic bench. Her husband stood an in- 
stant, strongly impelled to walk away and leave her to finish 
her hysterics by herself. But the next moment he reproached 
himself bitterly for the unworthy impulse. 

“ After all, she is my wife," he told himself, “ and she is 
not to blame that I can not love her. I have marked out for 
myself a cheerless path, and I must tread it to the bitter end 
without flinching. " 

He sat down beside her, and took her hand tenderly in his. 

“ Sara!" 

The unwonted softness of the caressing accents caused her 
to look up. “Oh! Oliver, you do love me, then?" 

“ Are you not my wife? Come, dear," glancing at his 
watch, “ it is nearly dinner-time now, and I want you to wear 
the blue silk dress — that is my favorite of all your wardrobe." 

Sara brightened up a little and allowed herself to be led 
onward toward the bridge. 

“ And you do think that Vic Avenel has disgraced herself?" 
coaxed she. 

• “My darling, don't be unreasonable. Let Miss Avenel 
and her affairs rest for a little while. Look at those scarlet 
leaves, hanging like drops of blood at the end of yonder maple 
bough. Shall I get you some for your hair?" 

“ I don't care for trumpery leaves," said Sara, remember- 
ing the picturesque wreath on Yictorine Avenel's hat. “ I'd 
much rather wear the pearl spray, or the aigrette of dia- 
monds. But, Oliver, you must promise me not to speak to 
Vic Avenel again, if you should meet her." 

“ 1 can not promise to be rude to any one, Sara." 

And Sara saw by the set look on her husband's lips that it 
would be in vain to insist. 

But she continued to be revenged in her feminine way. 
She sulked all the afternoon, and cried until her nose was red 
and swollen, and endeavored, in various other ingenious 
methods, to make Oliver St. Charles realize what an amiable 
and intelligent person he had married. 

The wedded pair had scarcely passed out of view amid the 
woods, when Lottie came up, carrying little Philip Treve- 
nard in her arms, all covered with blue asters. 

8 


226 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“ Wook at me! wook at me!” cried the child, clapping his 
little slender hands. 

“ Only see him, Vic,” cried out Lottie, almost equally de- 
lighted with the boy. “ Doesn’t he look like a picture? Why, 
Vic, what is the matter?” as she suddenly glanced up at her 
sister’s deathly pale face and quivering lips. 

“ Cross yady!” cried out Jacquelind, with a grimace 
comically like the contortions of Mr. St. Charles’s features. 
“ Scolded Vicky!” 

“ Me frow stone at her,” said Nimmy, hurling a pebble in 
the direction in which the rustling draperies had trailed away. 

“Oh, Lottie,” whispered Victorine, “I have seen him! 
He is here. ” 

“ Did he speak to you?” eagerly interrogated Lottie. 

“ Of course. Is he not a gentleman? But his wife was so 
insulting!” 

“ Insulting!” Lottie set her pearl-white teeth together. 
“ What did she dare to say, Victorine?” 

“ She said 1 had bound myself to a menial’s place — that I 
must not presume again to recognize her,” said Victorine, un- 
consciously clasping her hands, as she realized anew the scorn 
and contumely of Sara St. Charles’s words. 

“ And he? Was he such a poltroon as to stand by and 
listen to such words?” indignantly demanded Lottie. 

“ Oh, no, no! He had walked on. She would not have 
dared to speak so before him." 

“And what did you say?” 

“ I told her I should not trouble her with my society or 
recognition. ” 

“ That was right,” said Lottie, with a long breath. “ Oh, 
Vic, when I see how cruel women can be to one another, I 
cease to wonder, as I once did, at the savage barbarism of the 
old Indians torturing their captives. Kiss me, Vio. Don’t 
mind her.” 

“ But, Lottie — ” 

“ Well?” 

“ I love him! Oh, I love him better than 1 ever did! Oh, 
Lottie, what shall I do?” 

“Hush,” said Lottie, growing pale. “ Remember, he is 
another woman’s husband. Come, let us walk on.” 


LOTTIE AND VICTOR IN E. 


227 


CHAPTER XLI. 

GATHERING AUTUMN LEAVES. 

It was not an agreeable life that Mrs. Oliver St. Charles led 
her husband for the next two or three days. She had an in- 
ward conviction that although her husband belonged to her, 
and her alone, by the sacred bonds of the marriage tie, his 
heart was not all her own, and forgetting how she had herself 
conducted all the wooing, literally forcing him to propose to 
her, she set herself diligently at work to penetrate the inner 
secrets of his soul. Half mad with jealousy, she watched his 
every motion as a stealthy cat might watch a mouse, ready to 
misinterpret the slightest action, and view every chance occur- 
rence through the distorted medium of a woman’s unreasoning 
prejudice. 

It was only the next day that Victorine was out on the hotel 
piazza, walking up and down with Nimmy and Jacquelind, 
when a croquet-party organized on the lawn just below, which 
was presently joined by Mr. and Mrs. St. Charles. At the 
sound of Sara’s loud, familiar voice, Victorine started, and 
half turned to the door. 

“ Come, children,” said she, “ let us go in.” 

“No, Vitty, no,” pleaded Monimia. “Me just got to 
playing.” 

“ It don’t rain!” said Jacquelind, in whose small mind bad 
weather was the only possible reason for going into the house. 

So Victorine remained, secluding herself behind a bowery 
screen of morning-glories, and hoping that Mrs. St. Charles 
would not see her, until, by some unlucky conjunction of her 
planetary orbs, a brisk autumn breeze blew off her hat, land- 
ing it on the croquet ground, almost at Mrs. St. Charles’s 
feet. 

She was hurrying down to recover it, when Oliver St. 
Charles picked it up, and springing lightly up the hotel steps, 
returned it with a bow. 

“ Thanks,” she murmured, almost inaudibly, a deep crim- 
son suffusing her whole face, even to the roots of her hair. 
And then she turned and hastily retreated into the house, 
carrying Nimmy and Jacky with her, in spite of their earnest 
entreaties to be allowed to remain and play a little while 
longer. 

“ We’ll go out on Goat Island,” coaxed Victorine, “ and 
get acorns there to throw into the rapids.” 


22 8 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


Mrs. St. Charles, who had watched the whole scene, greeted 
her husband with a sarcastic smile, as he returned to his mal- 
let. 

“ 1 congratulate you upon your good fortune, Oliver,” said 
she. “ Of course, it was all an understood thing! A signal, 
perhaps!” 

Mr. St. Charles did not reply, but the bar of color across 
his forehead showed that the taunt was neither unheard nor 
unheeded. 

But Sara threw down her mallet. 

“ 1 don’t care to play any longer,” said she. “ And I sup- 
pose that, since yonder pretty nurse-maid has gone in, the 
game has lost all interest for my husband also!” 

She walked away. St. Charles lingered only long enough to 
speak a few hurried words of apology to the other players, 
and then strode after her. 

“ Are you really tired of playing, Sara?” he asked. 

“lam tired of being made a fool of!” sharply retorted his 
wife — and for a second St7 Charles’s temper, hitherto reso- 
lutely restrained, blazed out. 

“ Sara,” said he, “I will not endure these base suspicions 
any longer. You may say what you like to me when we are 
alone, but you shall not insult me in the presence of others. 
Remember that, if you please!” 

Sara turned sharply upon him, her eyes gleaming with ser- 
pent light. 

“ 1 hate you, Oliver St. Charles!” cried she, scarcely know- 
ing, in her passion, what she said. ‘ ‘ I am sorry that I ever 
married you!” 

“Sara!” 

“ Go away from me! Don’t talk to me! You know that 
you are in love with that big-eyed, pale-faced Avenel girl — 
you know you don’t care for me!” 

“ Sara,” remonstrated her husband, “ you are talking like 
a maniac now. Have I ever given you reason for such lan- 
guage as this?” 

But Mrs. St. Charles hurried up to her own room and 
locked herself in, resolutely refusing entrance to her husband, 
no matter how earnestly he pleaded. 

“ How am I ever to endure a life like this?” St. Charles 
despairingly asked himself, as he went down into the reading- 
room to console himself as best he might until his refractory 
wife should regain her temper again. 

When Mrs. St. Charles came down to tea, her brow was 
black with sullen gloom. She sat through the whole meal in 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


si I once, and never spoke until they were once more in their 
own room. 

“1 have made up my mind,” she said, “ what to do. Fin 
going home!” 

“ Home?” repeated her husband, in surprise.- 

“ Yes, home to Fordham Manor. Fm going to start on 
Saturday. I’d go to-day, only Leonie says my things won't 
be back from the laundry.'' 

“ Sara, are you in earnest?” demanded the thunder-struck 
husband. 

“ Of course Fm in earnest!” 

“ Do you mean to leave me?” he asked. 

“Yes, 1 do!” 

“ And for what reason?” 

“ Because Fm not happy.” 

“ Sara,” he pleaded, “ reconsider this. Remember that 
our lots are cast in together for life. Remember that we are 
husband and wife. Let us each endeavor to be charitable to 
the other's feelings, and strive to be as happy together as we 
can. It will not be my fault, dear, if we are not a model 
couple.” 

He would have drawn her gently toward him, but she jerked 
herself away. 

“Don't touch me!” she cried, inpatiently. “I'm sick of 
such hypocrisy!” 

“You are misjudging me cruelly, Sara.” 

“ I am reading you in your true character,” she said, scorn- 
fully. 

The next day was bright and mild — one of those beamy, 
balmy days that make the crown of beautiful October. There 
was to be an impromptu ball at the hotel in the evening — the 
closing affair of the season, as “ mine host ” said — and the 
ladies had all strolled over to Goat Island to collect autumn 
leaves, ferns, and mosses to decorate the ball-room. Mrs. 
St. Charles was one of the party, and with a sudden outburst 
of caprice, she had demanded her husband's attendance upon 
her. 

He went willingly, hoping that the request was a precursor 
of a happier mood on her part, and walked along chatting ' 
pleasantly, until they had crossed the bridge, and were on the 
island. Then she turned toward him with a harsh little laugh. 

“ You must think your society is particularly delightful to 
me,” said she. “ But do not flatter yourself that such is the 
case. I only brought you to make sure that you would not be 
flirting with Yictorine Avenel the whole time that I was gone.” 


230 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


And she hurried on with the others* leaving her husband 
standing alone, stung to the heart by her insulting speech. 

Mrs. Trevenard, who chanced to be of the party, glanced up 
as Sara swept by. 

“ What a very disagreeable woman Mrs. St. Charles is!” 
said she, to Miss Berringfield, a cherry-cheeked little damsel 
who was gathering moss beside her. “ 1 can not imagine how 
such a handsome man as her husband is ever came to marry 
her!” 

“ That’s just what I am marveling at the whole time,” said 
Miss Berringfield, laughing. “ And* she treats him exactly as 
if he were a paid lackey, too! I only wonder at his patience 
and good temper!” 

“ Look!” called out Sara’s high-pitched contralto voice just 
then. “ What a lovely cluster of red leaves there is, hanging 
close to the bank! Who will get it for us?” 

“ Pray, Mrs. St. Charles, don’t call any one’s attention to 
it,” said Mr. Berringfield, the father of the cherry-cheeked 
beauty. “ It hangs altogether too near the edge of the cliff.” 

“ Nonsense!” cried Sara, disdainfully. “It is prettier by 
half than anything we’ve got. And I know I could reach it 
easily enough. ” 

“ Sara!” called out her husband, who by this time was 
nearing the group, “ be careful! For Heaven’s sake, do not 
go so near the brink of that cliff!” 

But this one drop of opposition was all that was needful to 
brim over Sara’s cup of willfulness and caprice. 

“ You are all of you a set of cowards,” said she, with a 
scornful laugh. “ See!” 

And reaching over .to grasp at the pennon of fluttering red 
leaves, she broke it from the parent bough. Holding it up 
with a cry of triumph, she waved it over her head. But as 
she did so, she unconsciously stepped one pace further back 
than she had intended, and losing her balance fell headlong 
into the boiling chaos of waters below! 

All of this happened in one second, before the spectators, 
paralyzed with terror, could realize the horrible truth. And 
Oliver St. Charles, who, scarce an instant before, had beheld 
his living, breathing wife before him, was a widower. 

Mrs. Trevenard, who had been nearest to the fatal spot, fell 
fainting on the grass. Some screamed and fled; others 
tempted the horrible fate which had just befallen poor Sara, 
by striving to reach over and look at the whirlpools of foam 
and spray where the unfortunate woman had disappeared; 
others ran for aid which could be of no earthly use or avail. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORIA. 


231 


And the first that Victorine Avenel knew what had occurred 
was when a crowd of servants brought the senseless form of 
her mistress home, and told, in confusion of bewildered 
tongues, that Mrs. St. Charles was ingulfed in the thunderous 
depths of Niagara Falls. 

“ And Mr. St. Charles?” asked a scared maid, speaking the 
question that Victorine had longed to ask, but dared not. 

“ He has taken the four-o’clock express train, to break the 
news as gently as possible to her parents,” said the head 
waiter, who had assisted in carrying Mrs. Trevenard upstairs. 
“ Poor gentleman! he looked, for all the world, like a ghost. 
It was awful sudden— and he not married two months, they 
say! I don’t see, for my part, why people can’t be more care- 

And thus ended the brief honey-moon for which poor Sara 
Fordham had so schemed and plotted. Like apples of Sodom, 
her happiness had turned to ashes between her lips, and the 
thunders of Niagara pealed an awful requiem above her un- 
known sepulcher. 

A long nervous fever followed the sudden shock which Mrs. 
Trevenard had received — and the two sisters nursed her 
through it, with infinite patience and tenderness. The chil- 
dren missed none of their usual care and provident attention 
— little pale Philly was watched over by Lottie with uninter- 
mitting devotion, and Nimmy and Jacky bloomed like two 
roses, as the autumn weeks crept on. 

“ What would 1 ever have done without you and Lottie?” 
asked Mrs. Trevenard, when at last she was able to sit up in 
a pillow-lined easy-chair. “ But, Victorine, you are as pale 
as marble! I have been too selfish and absorbed in my own 
aches and pains to heed how much I was exacting of you!” 

“ It is nothing, dear Mrs. Trevenard,” said Victorine, with 
a faint smile. “ I shall soon be well, now that I can once 
more exercise in the open air.” 

But all this time the name of Oliver St. Charles was never 
once spoken between Lottie and Victorine, in all their whis- 
pered confidences. 


CHAPTEE J£LII. 

“i WILL NEVER REST UNTIL I FIND HER.” 

Valencia Eden had gained the point for which she had 
striven so anxiously, but at the same time she was ill satisfied 
with the result of her machinations. Wallace Falconbridge 
had no definite means of proving his suspicions, but he was as 


232 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


certain as if he had seen the whole occurrence that Valencia’s 
was the hand that penned the false telegram — the fatal mis- 
sive that had separated him from his young wife as effectually 
as if oceans rolled between them. He had written to 
Valencia in Florida, asking plainly if such were not the fact. 

Valencia had written back four pages of vehement denial, 
with a little tender reproach artfully thrown in, and a few 
tear-blots scattered here and there on the perfumed sheet of 
Pirie note-paper. And that had been the end of the corre- 
spondence. Wallace knew perfectly well that his cousin was 
guilty, and Valencia was well aware that he knew it. Being 
a woman, he could not punish her with downright vengeance, 
as he would have done had she belonged to the other sex — but 
he vowed within himself that he would never see or speak to 
Valencia Eden again. 

And in so far, Valencia’s little plots and plans had been an 
utter failure. 

But all this time he was far from being idle. Lottie was 
lost — that was a fact beyond all doubt > but Falconbridge was 
certain, with the sanguine hopefulness of youth, that he could 
trace out her hiding-place, sooner or later. 

“ Poor little darling!” he murmured to himself, “ how deso- 
late and heart-broken she must have been before she could 
have fled away, like Hagar, into the wilderness! My little 
loving Lottie! But I will find her yet, and, with God’s help, 
her future life shall be so happy that she shall never remem- 
ber this shadow that has overcast her existence so darkly!” 

And with the earnest and cordial co-operation and assistance 
of Gerald Maury, he set himself vigorously to work to seek for 
his lost bride. 

For a little time all clews seemed to evade his search — but 
one day a friend came into Gerald Maury’s comfortable Hew 
York lodgings to smoke a cigar and chat for an hour or two, 
and of course the conversation turned naturally to the topic 
of which Maury’s heart and brain were so full — Wallace Fal- 
conbridge’s lost wife. 

“ But 1 don’t see,” said Lionel Combe, “ how a person can 
sink so entirely out of sight, when half a dozen people are 
moving heaven and earth to find her.” 

“Nor I, either!” said Gerald, disconsolately. “But it’s 
the case, you see!” 

“ She must be someiuhere !” cried out Combe. 

“ Yes, but where?” 

“ By George, it’s the queerest tangle I ever heard of! Sho 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE 233 

must have taken some other name!” said Combe, staring at 
a bust of Apollo on an opposite bracket 

44 That's it, of course!” 

44 What was her name when she was a girl?” asked Combe. 

44 She's not much more than a girl now, for the matter of 
that,'' said Maury, shrugging his shoulders. “ But her maiden 
name was not a common one — Avenel.'' 

Combe sprung to his feet and brought the palm of his hand 
down on the table with an emphasis that made the wax tapers 
jump out of a small bronze receiver close by. 

44 Look here!” said he. “I've just come from Niagara 
Falls!” 

“ I don't see the occasion for making such a noise about 
it,” said Maury. 

“ No, but— there's a family named Trevenard there — lady's 
been very sick — and they've got a nursery governess, or nurse, 
or something, named Avenel.” 

Gerald leaned eagerly forward, with a glad glitter in his 
eyes. 

“ Have you seen her?” 

“ No — how should I? But I remember hearing Trevenard 
speak the name, and thinking how odd it was — like the 1 White 
Lady of Avenel,' you know, in Scott's novel of the 4 Mon- 
astery. ' ” 

“ You are quite sure that was the name?” 

“ Sure? Of course I am! How could I be mistaken?” 

“ Are they there still — this family of Trevenards?” ques- 
tioned Maury. 

“ I suppose so. They were when I left Niagara three days 
ago.” 

Gerald rose up and then sat down again, pondering what 
course to adopt. 

“ I wonder what 1 had better do about it?” said he, as if 
to himself. 44 It is a great pity that Falconb ridge has just 
gone to Canada to leave new directions with the detective police 
in Montreal, Quebec,, and those cities to which, from her fa- 
miliar associations with them as a child, she may possibly 
have gone.” 

44 Telegraph to him,” suggested Combe. 

44 And bring him back here for what may, after all, be only 
a deceptive clew? No, Lionel— if you could see how worn 
and haggard he is, with the constant anxiety and suspense of 
this unfortunate business, you would comprehend the injudi- 
ciousness of putting him unnecessarily on any false track. 
I’ll tell you what I'll do, Combe— I'll go myself. If this is 


234 


LOTTIE AND VICTOIIINE. 


really Lottie, I shall have the happiness of telling him that 
she is found. If it is not — as is most undoubtedly among the 
probabilities — the disappointment will be mine alone, and I 
shall not have to reproach myself with adding one hair’s 
weight to the burden of grief that he already bears.” 

“You’re a good fellow, Maury,” said Lionel Combe, en- 
thusiastically. “ And if ever I get into a tight place, I only 
hope I may have a friend like you to fall back upon. But 
look here!” 

“ Well?” 

“ You say she had a sister. Why don’t you go to this sis- 
ter? Or have you already done so?” 

“ She has a sister; but her sister was living in the family of 
Mrs. Hartford, on Lexington Avenue. We went thither 
when first this wretched girl came, and learned that the Hart- 
fords had gone to -Europe, and were traveling, with no definite 
address, except poste restante, at Florence, where they ex- 
pected to arrive about the first of December. So, you see, we 
are high and dry there.” 

“ It’s exactly like a novel,” said Combe, musingly, as he 
puffed away at his cigar. 

“ I will take the night train to the Falls, ’'said Maury. 
“ There is not a moment to lose, lest even this clew should slip 
out of our reach. 1 am sure you will excuse me. Combe, for 
leaving you, to see to some minor affairs that I can not neglect, 
previous to my journey.” 

Combe smiled. “ A polite way of turning me out,” said 
he. “ However, you are excusable, under the circumstances. ” 

A night’s ride in an express train does not tend to make one 
feel comfortable or look fresh, and Gerald Maury was still 
half asleep as, after a bath and a breakfast, he sauntered out 
to make inquiries and learn what he could upon the subject 
of his quest. 

The servant who was sweeping dead leaves from the front of 
the piazza proved able to enlighten his ignorance somewhat. 
There was a family, he said, named Trevenard, staying at the 
International Hotel. He knew it, because he had heard his 
fellow-domestics speak of how terribly ill the poor lady had 
been. . She had a nursery governess called Avenel— a very 
beautiful young lady. 

“ And there she is now, sir,” he added, as Gerald Maury’s 
heart began to throb high with hope, and he pointed to a tall, 
slender girl, dressed in black alpaca, with a black felt hat 
trimmed with a fringe of feathers, who had just turned a cor- 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 235 

ner of an opposite street, holding a rosy little child in either 
hand. 

And, to his dismay, Gerald Maury looked into the face of an 
entire stranger. For, although there was some slight family 
resemblance between the two sisters, their expression, com* 
plexion, and the shape of their faces were so entirely dissim- 
ilar, that at the first glance they seemed unlike as light and 
darkness. 

Until the sharp shaft of disappointment pierced his heart, 
Gerald Maury did not know how confidently he had built on 
the hope of this Miss Avenel being his friend’s missing wife. 
He turned away sick and sad at heart and, two hours after- 
ward, was steaming homeward in the direction of New York. 

“Thank Heaven!” he muttered to himself, “that I did 
not tell poor old Wallace of the business I was on. It has 
been neither more nor less than a wild-goose chase, after all, 
and yet 1 was so certain that it was she. ” 

If Mr. Maury had lingered but a moment longer under the 
dropping leaves of the large elm-trees that lined the sidewalk, * 
he would have seen another and slighter figure, wrapped in a 
scarlet shawl, trij3 lightly around the corner, with cheeks that 
rivaled the shawl in color — Lottie herself. 

“ Oh, Vic, 1 have run so fast!” cried she, rosy and breath- 
less, as she took little Jacquelind’s hand, and passed the other 
through Victorine’s arm. “ I knew 1 should overtake you be- 
fore you had walked far. Mrs. Trevenard has fallen asleep 
at last, and Mrs. Marvyn has promised to sit with her for an 
hour, while 1 get a breath of fresh air.” 

And, arm in arm, the two sisters passed beneath the ledge 
of the very window of the room where Gerald Maury was reck- 
lessly flinging his things into his valise for the homeward 
journey. 

If he had only known! 


CHAPTER XLIII. 

A CLEW AT LAST. 

When - Wallace Falconbridge returned from the expedition 
to Canada, which had proved utterly bootless, except in the 
way of providing for future exigencies, Gerald Maury spoke no 
word of his own bitter disappointment. Lionel Combe called, 
as soon as he heard of Maury’s arrival in New York. 

“ Well,” said he, breathlessly, “ what luck? Though I see 
in your face that something is wrong. Wasn’t it she?” 

Maury shook his head. 


LOTTIE AND YICTORINE. 


236 


“No/’ said he, “ it was not she.” 

“ The deuce it wasn’t! And I have been the cause of giv- 
ing you a long journey and a false alarm, and all for nothing! 
I wish I had held my confounded tongue!” 

“ My dear fellow!” said Maury, smiling in spite of himself, 
“ I am just as much obliged to you as if it had been a success 
from beginning to end. Your intentions were excellent, and it 
is through no fault of yours that the result has been a failure.” 

And honest Lionel was somewhat comforted at this. 

When Maury first saw his friend after his return from 
Canada, he looked with troubled eyes into the worn and pallid 
face of the bereaved husband. 

“ Falconbridge,” said he, “ this won’t do. You are wear- 
ing yourself out. You must take rest.” 

“ Rest!” bitterly echoed the other. “ How can I rest, 
when, for all that I know, she may be suffering and alone. 
Before God, I will never rest until I find her — until I have 
asked her pardon, on my knees, for all my cruelty and neg- 
lect. Gerald, do you know what I fear?” 

Maury was silent, and Falconbridge went excitedly on. 

“ I fear, day and night, that she is dead— that suffering and 
sorrow and solitude have worn her out! And if it should be 
so,” speaking low, and with a shudder convulsing all his 
nerves, “ she will have died the death of a sainted martyr, 
and I — I shall have been her murderer!” 

“ Wallace, you are out of your senses,” soothed Gerald. 

“ Say, rather, that I have just come into possession of 
them,” retorted Falconbridge. “ I have determined to go on 
to Florence as soon as there is any reasonable hope of meeting 
these Hartford people. Lottie’s sister is with them, and Lot- 
tie’s sister must know where she is! In the meantime, 1 have 
telegraphed to Paris, London, and all the intermediate points 
where a family of American tourist would be likely to stop, 
for instant information of their arrival.” 

“ Not a bad plan,” said Maury. 

The wisdom of Falconbridge ‘s conduct was presently justi- 
fied. About three weeks thereafter, there came a brief tele- 
gram from the Hotel de Montague at Geneva. 

“ Mrs. Hartford and suite are here. Arrived last night.” 

Falconbridge instantly telegraphed back: 

“ Is Miss Avenel of the party?” 

The return message once more plunged him into the gloom- 
iest depths of despondency. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


23 ? 


“ No such name on the hotel register.” 

“ You had better write in full or go yourself,” said Maury. 

“ I will go myself,” said Wallace. “ We have already lost 
time enough by these idle delays. Most probably there is some 
mistake! She must be there!” 

And Mrs. Hartford was astonished, about two weeks after- 
ward, by the unexpected appearance in her hotel parlor of a 
tall, pale man with sunken, glittering eyes, and hectic spots 
of fatigue on either cheek. 

“ Pardon my seeming intrusion,” he said, lifting his hat 
with the polished courtesy of a gentleman “ to the manner 
born.” “ My name is Wallace Falconbridge.” 

“But I don’t know who Wallace Falconbridge is,” said 
Mrs. Hartford, with a puzzled face. “ Stay — yes, I do. 
You are Lottie’s husband?” 

Falconbridge’s face lighted up. 

“ Yes,” he answered, breathlessly. “ I am Lottie’s hus- 
band! And I am searching for Lottie’s sister, to see if she 
can give me any information as to where she has gone. Miss 
Avenel is here?” 

Mrs. Hartford shook her head. 

“No,” she said. “ Victorine left me the week before we 
started from New York.” 

Falconbridge sunk into a chair and pressed his hand against 
his forehead. 

“ Again!” he muttered to himself. “ Baffled again!” 

“ Let me offer you a glass of wine,” said Mrs. Hartford, 
soothingly. “ You look worn and exhausted.” 

He drank the wine without seeming to know whether it was 
water or something stronger — but it revived him. 

“ I can tell you, however,” added Mrs. Hartford, “ where 
Victorine Avenel is — or, rather, where she was going at that 
time — to the house of a Mrs. Trevenard, an intimate friend 
of my own, on Forty-seventh Street.” 

Falconbridge sprung to his feet, with new life and energy 
coursing through his veins. 

“ And she is there still?” 

“ I have no reason to suppose that she has left Mrs. Trev- 
enard. And,” Mrs. Hartford paused an instant, almost afraid 
of the effect of a sudden shock on the pale and wasted traveler 
before her, “ her sister was with her.” 

“ Lottie?” 

“Yes, Lottie.” 


238 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


The clew was found at last, and Falconbridge knew that his 
long and wearisome journey had not been in vain. 

“ Mrs. Hartford,” he said, pressing her hand in both of his 
own, “ how can 1 ever thank you for being the messenger of 
good tidings to one who for months has met with nothing but 
rebuffs and disappointments? I will return to the United 
States at once, and — ” 

“ Stop,” said Mrs. Hartford, kindly. “You are not fit 
for traveling.” 

“ I am fit for anything, now,” he answered, impatiently. 
“Your words have stimulated all my pulses like a tonic. 
Hope is better than medicine.” 

“ But you can not go until night, at all events. The dili- 
gence does not leave until five. And in the meantime, I 
think it my duty to tell you that your wife is deeply incensed 
against you.” 

“ 1 do not blame her,” said Falconbridge, dejectedly. “ I 
have deserved all the reproaches she can possibly cast upon 
me. There are no extenuating circumstances which 1 can pos- 
sibly plead in my own behalf.” 

“ 1 urged her to return to your home in Boston, and wait 
for an explanation of seemingly inexplicable circumstances,” 
added Mrs. Hartford; “ but — ” 

“ God bless you for that,” said Falconbridge, fervently. 

“ But she was too indignant — too deeply hurt to listen to 
my arguments,” said Mrs. Hartford. 

“ I will tell you all,” said Falconbridge, “ if you will per- 
mit me, that is. ” 

“ I shall be glad to listen,” said Mrs. Hartford, whose 
sympathetic nature was already enlisted in behalf of her vis- 
itor. 

And Wallace Falconbridge told the whole story just as it 
had occurred, with its dark veins of duplicity and treachery, 
its complications of unfortunate circumstances, and its deep 
under-current of love and sorrow, while soft-hearted little 
Mrs. Hartford wept as she listened. 

“ 1 know that 1 have been weak and wicked,” he concluded, 
“ but do you think that I can not bring her to forgive me?” 

“ If you plead to her as you have pleaded to me, she can 
not help forgiving you,” cried Mrs. Hartford. “ It would 
not be in a woman’s nature to resist. I wish you all success, 
Mr. Falconbridge, but if I had my way — ” 

“Well?” 

“ 1 would have that evil genius of a cousin of yours hung, 
drawn, and quartered!” 


- - - - 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


239 


CHAPTER XL1V. 

THE HUSBAND’S CONFESSION. 

Several weeks had elapsed since Mrs. Trevenard had been 
pronounced by her attending physicians sufficiently recovered 
to be transferred by easy stages to her home in New York; and, 
of course, Lottie and Victorine Avenel went witlj, her. 

“ I shall never consent to part with you again, girls,” said 
Mrs. Trevenard, with tears in the eyes which had once seemed 
so cold and hard to the young girls. “ For I believe that I 
should-have been in my grave, and my little ones left moth- 
erless, if it had not been for your care and devotion.” 

It was a bleak morning in December; Mrs. Trevenard, who, 
since her return, had taken her* tea and toast in bed, not ris- 
ing until near noon, had not yet made her appearance in tho 
drawing-room, where a bright fire of anthracite coal burned 
in the grate, and a vase of crimson and cream-colored roses 
stood in a gilded tripod, all hung with glittering chains, in 
the bay-window. Little Philly was fast asleep. Jacky and 
Nimmy were in their play-room, absorbed in the mysteries of 
a box of colored blocks, capable of a variety of curious com- 
binations, which seemed little short of Aladdin-like magic to 
the two small maidens. 

Lottie Falconbridge, who had just gathered the roses from 
the little conservatory at the back of the house, stood arrang- 
ing them in the tall Bohemian glass, with eyes that rested lov- 
ingly on the velvety petals, and Victorine had just come in to 
feed and coax the two gold-plumaged canaries who hung from 
tho ceiling, when the parlor-maid, a spruce damsel, with a 
fluted muslin cap and ribboned apron to match — who secretly 
regarded it as “a pretty state of things ” that the nurse and 
nursery governess should be “ fine ladies,” and admitted on 
terms of affectionate equality with Mr. and Mrs. Trevenard, 
while she, Amanda Ann, was kept on a level with the other 
servants — came in. 

“ It’s a gentleman,” said she, with a protesting toss of the 
head. “ Leastways, he is dressed like a gentleman, and wears 
a diamond ring on his little finger. Wants to see Miss 
Havenel.” 

“ Which Miss Avenel?” asked Victorine. 

“He didn’t say.” Amanda Ann evidently regarded the 
nursery governess as being unnecessarily particular. 

“ Did he send up his name?” asked Lottie. 


240 


LOTTIE ANT> VICTORINE. 


“ No, miss, he didn’t.” 

“ Please go down and ask him for his card.” 

Amanda Ann departed, banging the door spitefully after 
her, and muttering some inaudible remark about “running 
the errands of them as wasn’t no better than site was!” 

Presently she returned with the visitors’ tray, a circle of 
frosted silver edged with a garland of silver ivy leaves, upon 
which reposed a card. 

Lottie took it from the salver — but as she read the inscrip- 
tion on the square of thick pasteboard, it dropped from her 
hand. 

“ Oh, Victorine!” she faltered, turning pale, “ it is lie /” 

“ Aha!” thought Amanda Ann. “ So Master Philly’s set-up 
nurse has got a follower! I’ll tell the housekeeper, as sure as 
I’m alive. ‘ No followers allowed.’ That’s the rule of the 
house! And I don’t see why Miss Havenel should be allowed 
to break the rules any more than me and the waitress, as is 
both of us a deal better looking than she is!” 

Yictorine stooped and picked the card from the floor, read- 
ing the name as she did so: 

“ Wallace Falconbridge!” 

“ Ask him to be kind enough to walk up, Amanda Ann,” 
said she. 

“ Oh, Victorine! what are j^ou saying?” cried Lottie, grasp- 
ing at her sister’s arm. “ 1 never can see him.” 

“ 1 will see him, dear!” said Victorine, with calm decision. 

“ Ask him to come up, Amanda Ann.” 

“ W T ell, if I ever!” thought that electrified damsel, as she 
flitted down-stairs. “In missus’s very drawing-room! It 
isn’t high life down-stairs, it’s low life upstairs! Why, 1 would 
be discharged in a minute if I put my head inside the drawing- 
room without permission, let alone havin’ my beau there! 
But I’ll see what the housekeeper thinks about such things as 
this!” 

Lottie turned with white face and wild, pleading eyes to 
Victorine. 

“ What shall you say to him, Victorine?” she asked. 

“ What you have so often desired me, Lottie, in case of an 
occurrence like this — that you never will consent to be his wife 
again. Go, dearest, before he comes.” 

But Lottie shrunk behind the fall of the luxurious garnet 
satin curtains that made a bower of the bay-window. 

“ Let me stay here, Victorine, and listen,” she uttered. 


___ 


LOTTIE AND AICTORINE. 241 

piteously. “ Oh, let me hear the sound of his voice once more, 
if nothing else. ” 

“ Lottie, are you wise?” 

“ lie is my husband, Yictorine! I loved him so dearly.” 

“ Lottie! Sister, is it possible,” cried Yictorine, stepping 
a quick pace or two % forward, “ that you love him yet?” 

' But Lottie did not answer. She only shrunk closer yet be- 
hind the curtains, clinging to the edge of the table that sup- 
ported a tiny alabaster statuette of weeping Niobe, while every 
vestige of color had deserted her cheek, and her eyes shone 
with fitful, fevered light beneath their long, jet-black lashes. 

While Yictorine, scarcely less pale than her sister, and con- 
trolling herself by a violent effort, stood awaiting the presence 
of the husband from whom Lottie had fled. 

Wallace Falconbridge entered, pale, grave, and composed. 
Victorine Avenel looked up into his face, secretly admitting to 
herself the wonderful charm of its classic beauty, yet resolved 
to steel herself to regard him as a tyrant and a despot. 

He bowed his head in her presence with graceful dignity. 

“ I am speaking to Miss Avenel?” he asked. 

Yictorine murmured a word or two of assent. 

“ Where is my wife?” he demanded, looking her full in the 
face. 

“ 1 do not recognize your right to ask the question, Mr. 
Falconbridge,” Yictorine answered, with spirit. “It is 
scarcely more than six months ago that my sister gave up all 
her happiness into your hands. How have you kept this sacred 
trust?” 

An indescribably mournful expression passed, shadow-like, 
over his face as he winced under the barbed arrow of Yictor- 
ine AveneFs words. 

' “Spare me this reproach,” he said. “Believe me. Miss 
Avenel, nothing that you can say will add to the torture of 
my own. accusing conscience. I acknowledge that I have been 
in the wrong, but not so much so as you perhaps have been 
led to think.” 

“ Led to think!” bitterly repeated Victorine. “ Do not the 
facts speak for themselves with sufficient accuracy?” 

“ I have loved your sister truly, and tenderly from the very 
first,” pleaded the unhappy husband. “ As God is my wit- 
ness, I have never faltered in that love!” 

“ The proofs you have given have been singularly strange,” 
said Miss Avenel, with a sarcastic smile. 

“ Will you oblige me by explaining yourself?” he asked. 

“ Is it necessary?” 


242 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“It is necessary/’ lie answered, with dignity, “ for me to 
know just what misapprehensions my wife has been laboring 
under, and just how far she has been taught, by the fatal force 
of circumstances, to distrust me.” 

“ Is it a proof, then, of a husband’s cherishing and pro- 
tecting love to leave your wife alone, in a strange place, for 
weeks and weeks — to respond to her pitiful letters with the 
coldest and briefest notes?” 

Falconbridge bowed his head again. 

“ I acknowledge all of which you would accuse me,” said 
he, with touching humility. “ I reproach myself far more 
bitterly for all these things than any one can reproach me.” 

“ And last, and crudest of all,” went on Victorine, with 
increasing spirit, as she saw the garnet satin folds of the bay- 
window draperies quiver in Lottie’s nervous grasp, and almost 
fancied that she heard her sister’s quick breathing, “ you sent 
her a telegram telling her to come to you at once — ” 

“That fatal telegram!” burst in Falconbridge, clinching 
his hand. 

“ And then, when she joyously obeyed its summons, you left 
her to the cruel taunts of a she-tigress, in a deserted home — 
left her, there and then, to learn that you had cast her off and 
disowned her, as a false flirt and a faithless wife! Oh, 
heavens!” and the vivid crimson blazed out on Victoriue 
Avenel’s 'cheeks, “that any one could dare to speak such 
things of my sister!” 

“ I do not deny that they were spoken,” said Falconbridge, 
“ but—” 

“You do not deny it?” repeated Victorine. “And yet 
you dare to stand here, and ask me where your wife is!” 

“ Hear me. Miss Avenel, before you condemn me utterly,” 
said the husband, sadly, yet sternly. “ Your words are cruel 
— unnecessarily so, as I think you will yourself confess when 
you know all.” 

“ Then justify yourself if you can,” said Victorine. “ I 
listen.” 

“ I will endeavor to do so,” he answered. “ In the first 
place, I never sent that telegram. ” 

“You never sent/t?” 

“ No, nor knew what was in it. Before the Heaven that 
is above us both, 1 swear that the telegram I sent was entirely 
different, both in letter and spirit.” 

And before the candid light of his eyes, Victorine Avenel 
could not but be convinced. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


243 


“ You do not perhaps know,” he resumed, “that my 
cousin, Valencia Eden, was bitterly opposed to my marriage 
with your sister, nor that she vowed revenge, sooner or later. 
Well, she carried out her hateful purpose with a deliberate 
system, a cruel persistence of which I could not have believed 
her capable. When I was at home, attending the bedside of 
my sick father, she contrived to poison my mind with pre- 
tended intelligence from friends at the Thousand Islands, 
where Lottie was staying — intelligence that she was forgetting 
her duty as a wife, in the society of my friend, Gerald Maury. 
I was mad with jealousy — beside myself with the stinging in- 
nuendoes which Valencia lost no opportunity of whispering. 
I can see, now, where I was wrong. I knew my wife’s pure 
heart, I knew equally well the noble and magnanimous nature 
of my friend — and yet I was^fool enough to believe Valencia. 
For that folly and madness I never can forgive myself. But 
let all that pass. Not all the repentance that ever flooded a 
world with tears can recall the past. Now 1 come to my own 
defense. The time arrived at last in which I awakened to a 
sense of my temporary madness, and eager to make amends 
as soon as possible, I telegraphed to Lottie that I would join 
her in a day or two at the Clissmond House, specifying the 
day, and requesting her to be ready to accompany me at once 
to New York. I had scarcely written the message on a slip 
of paper when I was called away by my father. During my 
absence, Valencia Eden called to me to know if she should 
send my message at once to the telegraph office. I assented 
— and, as I am now certain, she substituted an entirely differ- 
ent one in its place. 1 went on immediately to the Thousand 
Islands, but found, to my surprise, that she had left the hotel 
in company with Maury. From that moment to this I have 
been vainly seeking her — seeking her to entreat forgiveness 
for ever having, even in the slightest thoughts, so cruelly mis- 
judged her. Miss Avenel, you are her sister, and doubtless in 
her confidence. 1 entreat of you to tell me where she is!” 

Vietorine hesitated a moment. There was something in the 
manifest truth and earnestness of his vindication that softened 
her, in spite of her resolution to believe him in the wrong. 
But even as she paused, the garnet satin folds of the curtain 
parted, and Lottie herself came fluttering out, like a caged 
fairy from its prison, and ran into her husband’s outstretched 
arms. 

“Iam here, Wallace!” she cried out. “ Here, dearest, on 
your breast — close, close to your loving heart! Oh! my love, 
my love, my love! I will never doubt or distrust you again.” 


LOTTIE AND VICTtfRINE. 


2U 

“ My Lottie!” he murmured, scarcely believing his own 
senses. “ And you forgive me?” 

“ Freely, fully, dearest, if only in your turn you will for- 
give me. Oh! Victorine, don’t you see that he is worthy of a 
wife’s truest devotion?” 

And Victorine, smiling softly to herself at the sight of Lot- 
tie’s renewed happiness, went quietly upstairs to tell Mrs. 
Trevenard all about it. 

Mrs. Trevenard, with a soft shawl of costliest Indian fabric 
wrapped around her, lay on the sofa in her room, and listened 
to Victorine’s story with the greatest interest and surprise. 

“ Dear me,” cried she, “ it can not be possible! My little 
Lottie a married woman! And I never to suspect anything 
about it!” 

“ Because, dear Mrs. Trevenard, Lottie thought she should 
never see her husband again/and it hurt her to hear people 
call her by his name,” said Victorine. “So she wore the 
wedding-ring shut into a little locket that always hung around 
her neck.” 

“ I know,” cried Mrs. Trevenard, “1 know. I’ve often 
noticed it — a pretty little toy of black enamel, with a cross 
outlined in pearls on the outside.” 

“ Yes,” said Victorine, smiling, “ that is the very one.” 

“ And,” added Mrs. Trevenard, “ her husband is one of the 
Falconbridges of Boston? Why, Victorine, the Falconbridges 
are among the oldest families in the state. And I’ve always 
heard that they were immensely rich.” 

“ Yes,” said Victorine, in whose unsophisticated eyes this 
was one of the least of all Wallace Falconfc ridge’s attractions/ 
“ 1 believe they are very wealthy.” 

“ It’s the most delightfully romantic story I ever heard,” 
said Mrs. Trevenard, sprinkling cologne over her pocket- 
handkerchief, and bedewing her hands with perfumed spray 
from a crystal atomizer. “ And I suppose Lottie will be leav- 
ing me now. Oh, dear! what will dear little Philly do with- 
out her? I do hope, my love,” to Victorine, “ that you won’t 
be developing a life romance presently, too. For I never can 
do without you both.” 

Victorine smiled sadly and shook her head. 

“ There is no danger of that, Mrs. Trevenard,” said she. 
“ My life romances are over, for good and all.” 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


245 


CHAPTER XLV. 

THE PRESIDENT'S LEVEE. 

More than a year had elapsed since that December morning 
when Lottie Faleonbridge, safely sheltered behind the friendly 
folds of the wine-red satin curtains of Mrs. Trevenard's oriel 
window, listened to her husband's earnest pleadings, and for- 
gave him all that had seemed most unpardonable. More than 
a year-— and although the months had been garlanded with 
roses, to the happy married lovers it had seemed infinitely 
long and dreary to Victorine Avenel. 

Not that she allowed the secret pining and aching of her 
heart to be outwardly visible. Victorine Avenel was fashioned 
out of nobler metal than that. To all appearance she was se- 
rene and equable, always ready to share in the happiness of 
her sister and brother-in-law, and never sad or dispirited. It 
was only 1 when she was alone that the barrier of pride and 
self-control gave way, and she indulged herself in the sorrow- 
ful luxury of tears. 

But she strove resolutely against these constantly recurring 
proofs of her womanly weakness. 

“ 1 shall be an old maid, of course," she said to herself, 
“ and so 1 may as well prepare myself for the dreary future 
that lies before me. " 

And she resolved to interest herself in the progress of the 
busy world around her, in books, in science and art, and in 
the wide mission of charity which lies ever ready to the hand 
of every active and energetic follower of the Great Example. 

“ I may be unhappy," she thought, “ but I need not be a 
useless cumberer of my Father's vineyard." 

Thus she was striving to reconcile herself to the prospect of 
a life which no truly feminine woman can contemplate with 
pleasure, when an event occurred which altered the entire 
tenor of her existence. . _ 

It was one of the gayest winters ever known in the national 
metropolis, and Mr. and Mrs. Faleonbridge, with Miss Avenel, 
were occupying a superb suite of rooms at the Arlington 
House. Lottie enjoyed the brilliant whirl of society in which 
she was so marked a belle. Wallace Faleonbridge always en- 
joyed what pleased his wife, and Victorine Avenel was as happy 

or at so least she endeavored to convince herself— in one 

place as in another. 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


216 

It was the evening on which the first presidential levee of 
the season was to take place, and Mrs. Falconbridge had just 
come down-stairs in an elegant new toilet, especially imported 
lor the occasion, from the atelier of Worth in Paris — a dress 
of Nile-green satin, softened by folds of misty-green cr6pe, 
and caught up here and there by floating knots of grass 
sprinkled with dew-drops formed by tiny diamonds. A car- 
canet of diamonds flashed, like a ribbon of fire, about her 
round, white throat, and diamond pendants swung from her 
ears, while a single creamy Cape jasmine was fastened with a 
diamond arrow into the coiled braids of her abundant black 
hair. 

Falconbridge looked up admiringly at his fair young wife 
as she came in, carrying in one gloved hand the tiny bouquet 
of white roses and silvery ferns that Wallace had himself se- 
lected for her, that afternoon, in the Government greenhouses. 

“ Upon my word, Lottie,” said he, “ you look like a young 
girl anticipating her debut! No one would believe that you 
are the mother" of a three-months’-old baby, unless they took 
a peep into the bassinet upstairs for themselves !” 

“ Dear little fellow!” said Lottie, the soft mother-light 
shining into her eyes. “ He looked like a half-open rosebud 
under the lace draperies when I kissed him good-night.” 

Victorine entered at that moment, all in white, and Falcon- 
bridge looked from one to the other of the sisters. 

“ 1 don't know which of you two girls is the prettiest,” said 
he. “ Only I wish Victorine had a little more of your bright 
color in her cheeks, Lottie. There's the carriage now. Are 
you quite ready, fair ladies?” 

The East Room was crowded when the Falconbridge party 
arrived. Statesmen, politicians, and diplomatists mingled in 
the throng — beauties of all nations displayed their sweetest 
smiles and most elaborate costumes. Judges of the Supreme 
Court forgot the knotty points of law which tormented them 
daily, in the light badinage appropriate to feminine ears. 
Embassadors, glittering with stars and orders, left the fate of 
nations to take care of itself for the time being, while they 
sunned themselves in the smiles of fair women. While at the 
end of the room, pale, impassive, and apparently quite uncon- 
cerned in what was passing around him, the President of the 
United States bowed, shook hands, or nodded to the steady 
stream of new-comers, as one by one they paid the compli- 
ments of the evening to him, ere they lost themselves in the 
great throng which was flowing slowly around and around a 
kaleidoscopic glitter of flowers, diamonds and satins, which 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


247 


half hid the darker and more sober garb of the masculine por- 
tion of the assemblage. 

Mrs. Falconbridge and Miss Avene] had executed their 
sweeping courtesies to the President and Mrs. Grant, and been 
smilingly reminded by the latter of their engagement to dine 
the next day at the Executive Mansion, to meet a select delega- 
tion of friends from Massachusetts, and were just mingling 
in the promenade, when a familiar voice struck upon their 
ears. 

“ Is it possible? Can 1 believe my eyesight? Do I again 
behold my darling daughters?” 

And Lottie and Victorine found themselves face to face 
with — Mr. Avenel Churchleigh. 

Mr. Avenel Churchleigh had aged a good deal in the year 
which had passed, and looked like what he was, an elderly 
dandy, made up with padding and cosmetics, all of which 
were impotent to hide the inexorable signet of years. His eye- 
glass was lifted to his eyes — an imitation diamond ring flashed 
on the little finger of his left hand, while he wore an immense 
camellia-japonica fastened into the button-hole of his coat. 

“ How do you do, papa?” said Lottie, with the calm self- 
poise that no amount of surprise could deprive her of. “ Al- 
low me to introduce you to my husband, Mr. Falconbridge.” 

Mr. Avenel Churchleigh bowed low to the embodiment of 
rank and wealth in the person of his son-in-law, which, 
Hindoo-like, he was ready to fall down and worship at any 
moment. 

“ Ah, these girls, these girls!” he said, with a pensive sigh; 
“always ready to leave their old fathers for the gay young 
lovers who cross their paths.” 

Lottie smiled. She was remembering how abruptly the 
“ old father ” in question had left her once, without even the 
excuse of a gay young lover. Lottie had forgiven long ago— 
but her memory was not sufficiently elastic to allow her to 
forget. 

“ And Victorine, too!” said Mr. Avenel Churchleigh, draw- 
ing his younger daughter's arm within his as blandly as if he 
had not hurled cutting invectives and unpaternal epithets at 
her the last time they had met. “ Go with your wife, my 
dear Falconbridge — that is if you will allow me the liberty of 
calling you so — ” 

“ Oh, certainly!” said Wallace, good-humoredly. 

“ And I will try to be as good an escort as I can to 
Victorine. Keally, my love,” to his daughter, “you are 


248 


LOTTIE AXD VICTORIN'E. 


looking very well. I am quite proud of two such handsome 
girls. Of course you have seen St. Charles?” 

“ Mr. St. Charles!” 

The glowing scarlet suffused Victorine's cheek — she could 
not prevent herself from starting ever so slightly at the name 
she had scarcely dared to breathe, even to herself, for months. 

“ Didn't you know that he was here to-night? I came on 
from Charlesworth with him last night. He is going abroad 
next week, and came to Washington to see about some pass- 
ports and things.” 

“ Going abroad!” gasped Victorine. 

“Exactly. To be absent tenor twelve years,” said Mr. 
Avenel Churchleigh, who was rather proud of being in the 
confidence of a man like Oliver St. Charles. “ He purposes 
an extended tour through Arabia, China, and the East. 
It's a dangerous business, I tell him, between the plague and 
the pirates, and these murderous Eastern coolies, who wouldn't 
mind cutting a man's throat to get his tooth-pick; but he 
will go, and Charlesworth is to be -shut up, or let for a term 
of years.” 

“Indeed!” Victorine's pulses were throbbing, her cheeks 
burning, but she did not know what else to say. 

“ Sad affair that about poor Sara’s death, wasn't it?” pro- 
ceeded Mr. Avenel Churchleigh, who was immoderately fond 
of the sound of his own voice, and quite unconscious of the 
mental strain of heart and nerve with which his daughter list- 
ened. “ Poor St. Charles is quite cut up by it. I never 
fancied her myself; but there is no accounting for tastes. 
Frank has gone West; Mrs. Fordham is quite a martyr to the 
neuralgia, they tell me; and the poor squire grows older and 
more infirm every clay,” with a passing smirk at his own sat- 
isfactory reflection in an immense sheet of gold-framed mir- 
ror as they passed. “ And as I've always said — why, here he 
is now! St. Charles! St. Charles! hold on a bit! Here are 
the girls. Isn’t it a charming coincidence that I should have 
happened across 'em here?” 

And Victorine Avenel found herself standing face to face 
with the man she had loved so long and so hopelessly. 

The room seemed to swim around her — the many glittering 
lights of the mammoth chandeliers became blurred and con- 
fused before her sight, as the greetings and introductions 
passed. For once in her life she felt grateful to her father for 
that gift of ceaseless loquacity which filled up the awkward 
gaps of conversation, and served as a screen for her uncon- 
trollable emotion. But almost before she knew it, Mr. Avenel 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


240 


Churchleigh had darted off to make his simpering regards to 
a tall, highly rouged lady with whom he claimed acquaint- 
ance, saying, as he did so: 

“Just take care of my little girl a minute, St. Charles, will 
you, while I speak to Mrs. Miggleton?” 

And Victorine found herself by Oliver St. Charles’s side. 

“ You are going abroad?” she said, looking up with a quick 
breath. 

“ Yes, I am going abroad,” he answered. “Don’t you 
think the room very warm. Miss Avenel? Suppose we wan- 
der off into yonder little nook,” glancing toward a room be- 
yond the hall, “ where there is a possibility of a breath of 
fresh air?” 

Victorine murmured something which might be either as- 
sent or dissent. St., Charles chose to interpret it as the 
former, and led her unresisting steps toward a little room 
where a tiny statue of Hebe was garlanded with trailing smilax, 
and a low sofa was half hidden by stands of waving palms and 
giant-fronded ferns. 

“ Do you know why 1 am going abroad?” he asked, leaning 
against the fluted pillar that supported the flowers, as she sunk 
down on the sofa, almost dreading what should come next. 

“No,” she answered, almost inaudibly. 

“ It is because the light of hope and love has long died out 
on my home altar,” he said, sadly. “ It is because I have 
nothing to stay for.” 

“ I knew that you were a widower,” she faltered. 

“ It is not of that that I am speaking,” said St. Charles. 
“ Oh, Victorine, I had given up all hope — but the sight of 
your face to-night has kindled anew the fires within my heart! 
I may be mad, but’I can not restrain my lips from speaking 
the question 1 asked in vain more than a year and a half ago. 
Victorine, I can not live without your love. Here, on my 
knees, I plead for it once more!” 

A choking sob seemed to prevent her utterance. 

“ Mr. St. Charles,” said she, “ tell me frankly: is it only 
from pity that you ask me to become your wife?” 

“ Why do you ask me that question, Victorine?” 

And then she told him how she chanced to overhear the 
conversation that had transpired between himself and Mr. 
Avenel Churchleigh— the conversation that had blighted the 
bud of all her hopes and well-nigh broken her heart. He 
listened in silence. 

“ And was that the reason,” asked he, “ that you refused 
me so coldly, and left Charlesworth so abruptly?” 


250 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


“ That was the reason. How could I endure to think that 
you had asked me to marry you only because my own father 
had told you that I was breaking my heart for you? Mr. St. 
Charles, 1 would have died sooner than said yes.” 

“Was that fair, Victorine?” he asked, fixing his large, 
Spanish, soft eyes upon her face with touching reproach. “ Do 
you not think you ought to have given me a chance to vindi- 
cate myself? I loved you long before 1 spoke those words. 
I have loved you ever since. 1 married Sara Fordham, not 
because 1 loved her, but because I thought she might be hap- 
pier, and 1 knew I could not be more miserable. As things 
turned out, the ill-advised marriage was a fatal mistake. But 
that is over and gone. The past we can not recall, the future 
is our own. Dearest Victorine, tell me that you can learn to 
love me, even now. Speak but one word and I will abandon 
all idea of this Eastern journey, and remain in the native land 
which holds for me all that is most dear and blessed. My 
love and darling, I have passed through a fiery ordeal of trial 
and suffering, but I shall never regret it, if only 1 shall have 
been able to win you. Dear Victorine, sweetest and shyest of 
human flowers, will you be my wife?” 

And the whispering ferns and drooping sprays of smilax 
above were witnesses to Victorine AveneFs whispered “ Yes!” 

The wedding took place in the following spring, and the 
white roses were just beginning to bloom when Mr. and Mrs. 
St. Charles settled themselves in the old Moorish palace for 
the summer. Lottie Falconb ridge and her husband were to 
spend a few weeks there, and, rather to their surprise, Mr. 
Avenel Churchleigh appeared one sultry evening on the scene, 
with a Saratoga trunk, a new Russian leather hat-box, and a 
portable shower-bath. 

“ I thought I'd give you a pleasant surprise, my dear,” said 
he to Victorine. “ Hereafter 1 shall spend my winters in Bos- 
ton, with Lottie, and my summers with you. Nay, no thanks. 
I assure you it will be no inconvenience to me. And if it were, 
I feel it to be my duty to sacrifice myself to my dear daugh- 
ters!” 

Victorine and Lottie looked at each other as he followed 
the old butler up to his room, there to remove what stains of 
dirt and travel that had alighted on his immaculate linen and 
broadcloth. 

“ I wonder,” said Victorine, “if he remembers that sum- 
mer day at Quebec when he cast us off and cut himself loose 
from our destiny as coolly as if we were two old gloves for 
which he had no further use?” 


LOTTIE AND VICTORINE. 


251 





“ He has forgotten all that/' said Lottie, shrugging her 
shoulders. “ You ought to hear him telling Mr. Robert Fal- 
conbridge what a devoted father he has always been to his 
c darling girls/ ” 

“ What a wretched, forlorn pair we were in those days!” 
said Victorine, smiling. “ 1 could almost shed tears of pity 
for myself when I remember it all. But, oh, Lottie! if we 
only could have looked forward through the mists of solitude 
and sorrow which surrounded us then, and seen this Promised 
Land of joy!” 

“ Vic,” said Lottie, gravely, “I do think we are the two 
happiest wives in the world!” 

44 1 don't think anything about it,” said Victorine; “I 
know it!” 


THE END. 


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